The  true  Patrick  Henry 


George  Morgan 


With  twenty- four 
illustrations 


Philadelphia  &  London, 
<!•  B.  Lippincott  company, 
1907* 


LIST   OF   ILLUSTRATIONS  WITH   NOTES 

PAGE 

ELIZABETH  HENRY,  PATRICK'S  FEMININE  ALTER  EGO  .    .    .    236 

(Born  July  10,1749.  She  married  General  William  Campbell,  hero 
of  King's  Mountain,  and  by  him  had  two  children — one  the  beautiful 
Sarah  Buchanan,  wife  of  General  Francis  Preston  and  mother  of  a 
distinguished  line  of  men  and  women.  General  Campbell  died  at 
"  Rocky  Mills,"  Colonel  John  Syme's  seat  in  Hanover,  August  22, 
1781.  His  widow  married  General  William  Russell,  of  the  Conti 
nental  Army,  May  29,  1782,  and  by  him  had  four  children.  She  lived 
at  Aspenvale  and  the  Salt-works,  now  Saltville.  As  "  Madam  Rus 
sell"  she  was  of  celebrity  throughout  Virginia.  She  manumitted  her 
slaves  and  gave  up  her  lands  to  her  children.  She  kept  a  pulpit  in 
her  dwelling  for  itinerant  Methodist  preachers.  She  was  tall;  and 
when  little  Mr.  Madison,  then  a  candidate  for  the  Presidency,  visited 
her,  she  placed  a  hand  on  his  head,  pressed  him  to  his  knees,  and 
prayed  for  him  as  the  coming  Chief  Executive.  "  I  have  heard  all 
the  first  orators  of  America,"  said  Madison,  "  but  I  have  never  heard 
any  eloquence  as  great  as  that  prayer  of  Mrs.  Russell  on  the  occasion 
of  my  visit  to  her."  She  died  March  18,  1825.  There  is  an  idealized 
portrait  of  her  in  the  memorial  window  of  the  Methodist  church  at 
Saltville.) 

"  SCOTCHTOWN" 239 

(This  curious  old  dwelling,  owned  and  occupied  by  Patrick  Henry, 
was  also  the  girlhood  home  of  Dolly  Payne,  who  became  the  wife  of 
President  Madison.) 

DOROTHEA  SPOTSWOOD 319 

.  (Daughter  of  Governor  Alexander  Spotswood,  wife  of  Nathaniel 
West  Dandridge,  and  mother-in-law  of  Patrick  Henry.  She  was  a 
noble  dame.  The  photograph  is  from  a  painting.  Her  picture  has 
never  before  been  published.) 

"SALISBURY"      323 

(Here  Henry  lived  during  his  last  two  terms  as  Governor  of  Virginia. 
The  house  has  a  wide  hallway,  and  a  small  porch  on  each  of  its  four 
sides.  It  stands  two  miles  west  of  Midlothian,  Chesterfield  County, 
Va.,  and  thirteen  miles  west  of  Richmond.  The  estate  is  large.) 

"ATTEMPT   AT   THE   FEATURES"    OF   PATRICK    HENRY     .     .     .      386 
(This  is  a  tracing  by  Thomas   Crawford,  the  sculptor,  from  B.  H. 
Latrobe's  sketch-book.    Latrobe's  sketches  were  made  in  the  Federal 
Court  at  Richmond.     Henry  had  then  fought  all  his  battles,  and  was 
about  to  retire.) 

OLD  RED  HILL,  CHARLOTTE  COUNTY,  VIRGINIA 397 

(The  smaller  building  was  Patrick  Henry's  house.  It  was  his  last 
home.  He  added  only  the  shed  at  the  east  end,  that  he  might  hear 
the  patter  of  rain  on  a  roof.  The  two-story  part  was  erected  by  his 
son,  Colonel  John  Henry,  who  lived  at  Red  Hill  many  years.) 


''     j  M  a 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS   WITH    NOTES 

PAGE 

RED  HILL — PRESENT  VIEW 399 

(The  house  has  been  beautifully  remodeled  on  Colonial  lines.  The 
view  is  southward,  down  the  Valley  of  the  Staunton,  to  the  Halifax 
Hills.  Like  Mount  Vernon,  Red  Hill  is  a  Mecca  for  patriotic 
Americans. ) 


DOROTHEA  SPOTSWOOD  HENRY  , 402 

(Daughter  of  Patrick  Henry  and  his  second  wife,  Dorothea  Dan- 
dridge.  Sharpies,  the  English  artist,  made  a  picture  of  this  beautiful 
girl  when  she  was  eighteen,  and  the  reproduction,  here  presented,  is 
from  his  painting. ) 


TITLE-PAGE  OF  PATRICK  HENRY'S  FAMILY  BIBLE     ....    403 

(Now  at  Red  Hill.) 

LEAF  FROM  FAMILY  BIBLE 406 

(With  entries  in  Patrick  Henry's  handwriting  of  last  marriage  and 
birth-dates  of  children.) 

PATRICK  HENRY'S  CHAIR 420 

(In  his  last  illness  he  felt  less  pain  when  sitting  than  when  reclining. 
It  was  in  this  chair  that  he  died.) 


PATRICK  HENRY'S  DESK 420 

(This  stands  in  the  same  corner  at  Red  Hill  where  it  stood  when 
Patrick  Henry  used  it.  In  it  he  kept  his  letters  from  General  Wash 
ington,  Richard  Henry  Lee, and  others;  likewise  his  business  papers. 
Here  are  still  bestowed  his  personal  belongings,  keepsakes,  etc., 
including  a  penknife  which  his  uncle,  the  Rev.  Patrick  Henry,  gave 
him,  and  which  he  carried  in  his  pocket  till  the  day  of  his  death.) 


GRAVES  OF  PATRICK  HENRY  AND  WIFE  AT  RED  HILL    .   .    428 

(The  graveyard  at  Red  Hill  adjoins  the  garden  on  the  eastern  side. 
It  is  fifty  feet  square,  and  is  enclosed  by  a  boxwood  hedge.  Plain 
slabs  cover  the  graves  of  Patrick  Henry  and  Dorothea,  his  wife.) 


MEREDITH  AND  ROANE  FACSIMILES 429 

( Passages  from  the  memoranda  of  Colonel  Samuel  Meredith,  Henry's 
brother-in-law,  and  Judge  Spencer  Roane,  Henry's  son-in-law.) 
x 


Patrick   Henry,    Dates   and   Data 

Born,  "  Studley,"  Hanover  County,  Virginia....  May  29,  1736 

Clerk  in  store  1751 

Storekeeper     1752 

Married   Sarah   Shelton   1754 

Farmer   and    storekeeper   I754~59 

Admitted  to  bar    1760 

First  great  speech,  "  Parsons'  Cause  " 1763 

Moved  to  "  Roundabout,"  Louisa  County 1764 

Second  great  speech,  Stamp  Act   May  29,   1765 

Return   to   Hanover,   "  Scotchtown  " 1767 

At  bar  of  General  Court  1769 

Popular  leader  and  Burgess   1765-74 

In  Continental    Congress   *774~75 

"  Liberty  or  Death  "  oration   March  23,  1775 

Leader  of  "  Gunpowder  Expedition  " 1775 

Colonel  and  Virginia  Commander-in-Chief   1775 

Death  of  first  wife   1775 

Champion    of    Independence   1776 

Champion  of  Religious  Liberty  177^ 

Governor  (first,  second,  and  third  terms) 1776-79 

Married   Dorothea   Dandridge   1777 

Moved  to  "  Leatherwood,"  Henry  County 1779 

Leader  of  the  Assembly   I779~84 

Governor   (fourth  and  fifth  terms) 1785-86 

Moved  to  Prince  Edward  County 1786 

Returned  to  the  law   1288L 

Opposed  the  Federal  Constitution   17&& 

Argued  British   Debt   Case   1791-93 

Retired,   Red  Hill 1794 

Declined  United  States  Senatorship 1794 

Mission  to  Spain   1794 

Secretaryship  of   State   1795 

Chief-Justiceship     1796 

Governorship    1796 

Mission    to    France    1799 

Last  public  appearance  March  4,  1799 

Elected  to  the  Assembly 1799 

Died  at  Red  Hill,  aged  63   June  6,  1799 

Buried  at  Red  Hill,  Charlotte  County,  Virginia. 

xi 


Acknowledgments 


Kindness  at  the  hands  of  many  good  people,  in  Virginia 
and  elsewhere,  is  well  remembered  by  the  writer  in  connection 
with  his  work  of  gathering  and  verifying  data  for  this  Life 
of  Patrick  Henry.  Thanks  for  courtesies  are  due  to  Mrs.  Susan 
Bullitt  Dixon,  of  New  York;  Dr.  Lyon  G.  Tyler,  of  Williams- 
burg,  Va. ;  Robert  A.  Brock,  of  Richmond,  and  William  G. 
Stanard,  Secretary  of  the  Virginia  Historical  Society.  But 
especially  is  Mrs.  Elizabeth  Henry  Lyons  entitled  to  the  grate 
ful  acknowledgments  of  the  author  for  placing  at  his  service 
the  Henry  material  collected  at  Red  Hill  during  the  Nine 
teenth  Century.  This  material  includes  not  only  the  original 
papers  prepared  for  William  Wirt  by  various  acquaintances  of 
Patrick  Henry,  but  much  pertinent  matter  that  has  come  to 
light  since  William  Wirt's  day.  Mrs.  Lyons  also  aided  in  select 
ing  the  illustrations  used. 


The  True 
Patrick    Henry 

i 

INTRODUCTION 

VIRGINIA  this  year  rounds  out  her  three  centuries. 
Dividing  this  stretch  of  time  in  half,  we  are  at  the 
period  when  she  gave  to  the  world  her  most  spirited 
and  powerful  generation  of  men.  Washington  was 
among  these ;  and  one  of  the  foremost,  also,  was  Patrick 
Henry.  Why  and  how  it  was  that,  being  born  under 
the  flag  of  Great  Britain,  they  elected  to  live  and  die 
under  another,  everybody  knows;  but  to  gain  a  true 
understanding  of  them  it  is  necessary  to  reach  back 
into  the  comparatively  unilluminated  colonial  era. 
Therefore,  if  the  reader  will  put  his  ringer  at  the  chron 
ological  spot  suggested,  we  shall  have  a  useful  start 
ing-point  for  this  inquiry. 

A  question  at  once  arises :  Why  is  it  so  hard  to  get 
a  white  light  on  the  old  colonial  life  in  the  Chesapeake 
region  ?  There  is  no  such  difficulty  with  respect  to  New 
England,  or  New  York,  or  Pennsylvania.  The  New 
England  genius,  to  be  sure,  is  strong,  assertive,  tena 
cious  of  its  past;  cleaving  to  its  tutelary  ideals  and 
idols.  In  that  part  of  America,  the  colonists  settled  in 
congregations;  a  provincial  spirit  soon  developed,  and 
the  brisk  sons  of  Mayflower  stock  found  ample  matter 
-for  story  in  the  hardships  overcome  by  their  immigrant 
ancestors.  In  New  York  and  in  Pennsylvania  great 
towns  grew  up;  so  that  in  each  of  those  regions  local 

9 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

history  has  had  a  central  and  tangible  something  to 
revolve  about.  But  in  vain  did  the  Virginia  colonists 
seek  to  establish  large  towns.  There  was  "  James 
City,"  which  ruralized  itself  and  ended  in  being  James 
City  County.  Charles  City  County  is  a  like  instance. 
Throughout  the  tidewater  country,  families,  as  a  rule, 
dwelt  in  sequestration.  The  laws  of  the  people,  their 
commerce,  outlook  upon  the  world,  domestic  ways, 
habits  of  thought,  occupations,  dress — all  were  so  dif 
ferent  from  ours  in  this  age  as  to  hinder  us  from  a 
sympathetic,  close  approach. 

Yet  this  difference  does  not  of  itself  account  for  the 
difficulty  of  getting  a  grasp  on  the  generation  preceding 
that  of  Patrick  Henry.  Not  only  is  her  historical 
period  longer  than  that  of  any  other  Anglo-American 
region,  but  Virginia  has  been  the  victim  of  much  icon- 
oclasm  and  some  ill-will.  Iconoclasts,  for  example, 
have  tried  to  break  Captain  John  Smith's  head ;  which 
they  would  have  been  slow  to  attempt  had  that  lively 
man  of  action  been  still  in  the  flesh.  They  have  tried 
to  kidnap  Pocahontas  from  the  book  of  chronicles  and 
lock  her  in  the  cave  of  myths.  They  have  attacked  the 
long-accepted  idea  that  what  is  called  the  "  cavalier  " 
element  entered  into  and  colored  colonial  life  on  the 
banks  of  the  James,  the  York,  the  Rappahannock,  and 
the  Potomac.  There  was  a  time  when  many  Virginians 
themselves  saw  fit  to  discourage  the  cavalier  idea. 
Hugh  Blair  Grigsby,  in  1855,  though  admitting  that 
some  of  the  "  butterflies  of  the  British  aristocracy " 
had  fluttered  across  the  water,  scornfully  declared  that 
the  cavalier  "  was  essentially  a  slave — a  compound 
slave,  a  slave  to  the  king  and  a  slave  to  the  church ;  he 
was  the  last  man  in  the  world  from  whom  any  great 
elemental  principle  of  liberty  and  law  could  come." 
Beverley  Tucker  said :  "  It  is  deemed  arrogant  to 
remember  one's  ancestors ; "  and  it  is  a  picturesque 

10 


INTRODUCTION 

fact  that  General  John  Bull  Davidson  Smith  of  Hack- 
wood  Park,  in  the  fervor  of  his  democracy,  burned  all 
the  papers  that  traced  his  blood  back  to  aristocratic 
fountain-heads.  There  were  more  burnings  of  a  differ 
ent  sort  during  the  Civil  War,  when  many  an  ancient 
garret  suffered  sack  and  despoliation,  to  the  detriment 
of  history.  But  the  Virginiaphobists  of  the  bitter  sec 
tional  days,  and  the  iconoclasts  who  sought  to  destroy 
the  romantic  elements  of  Hakluyt's  "  western  planting 
time,"  have  alike  been  put  to  shame.  The  conclusion 
of  the  best  scholarship  of  the  day  is  that  Captain  John, 
the  "  Admiral,"  was  really  an  example  of  what  a  man 
"  may  be,  may  do,  and  may  endure."  As  for  Poca- 
hontas,  she  steps  upon  her  pedestal  again.  The  cava 
lier,  so  called,  is  also  rehabilitated;  though  not  without 
common-sense  reservations.  He  was  of  less  conse 
quence  than  one  of  the  two  existing  schools  of  Virginia 
writers  would  make  him  out.  Of  these  schools,  the  first 
includes  those  who  seek  to  preserve  and  refine  the  old 
idealities,  and  the  other  is  composed  of  critical  students 
who  are  willing  to  accept  a  fact,  whether  flattering  or 
otherwise,  if  its  verity  be  beyond  dispute.  Research 
is  at  odds  with  Romance.  The  unimaginative  delver  in 
court  records  and  in  the  colonial  archives  looks  askance 
upon  the  work  of  writers  who  set  forth  Virginia  scenes 
as  they  would  like  them  to  appear,  not  as  they  know 
them  past  peradventure  to  have  been.  Thus  it  happens 
that  the  skies  of  history  are  not  always  clear  when  one 
attempts  to  realize  and  visualize  the  early  Virginians.* 

*  If  Alexander  Brown's  powerful  contention  should  be  es 
tablished,  Virginia  history  would  be  illumined  from  the  begin 
ning.  This  contention  is  that  Bacon's  friend  Sir  Edwin  Sandys, 
Shakespeare's  friend  Henry  Wriothesley,  third'  Earl  of  South 
ampton,  and  other  zealous  and  courageous  forerunners  of  the 
Cromwellian  order  strove  to  establish  a  free  England  on  these 
shores;  that  James  I.,  at  heart  a  despot,  cunningly  set  to  it 
by  Court  Gondomar  of  Spain,  sought  by  fair  means  or  foul 

II 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

Topographically,  their  spacious  tidewater  region  is 
easy  to  grasp.  Four  rivers,  flowing  east  by  south,  come 
out  of  the  Blue  Ridge;  traverse  a  fertile  piedmont; 
take  their  fall  and  pass  on  to  the  bay,  broadening  as 
they  go.  On  the  piney  shores  were  the  plantations, 
reaching  back  for  miles.  Some  of  the  houses  were 
brick,  some  frame — with  green  lawns  and  much  life 
about.  English  ships  came  to  the  landings,  and  black 
men  rolled  hogsheads  of  tobacco  on  board.  These  and 
similar  things  by  the  score  are  well  enough  known. 
We  know,  too,  that  there  was  a  downright  sun-sparkle 
on  the  rivers;  that  the  Eighteenth  Century  mocking- 

to  circumvent  the  reformers ;  and  that  the  King  and  Court 
party,  overcoming  the  Patriot  party,  proceeded  to  confiscate 
and  destroy  all  documents  squinting  at  constitutionalism,  thus 
corrupting  and  falsifying  history  to  their  own  ends.  Brown 
would  revolutionize  Virginia  history.  His  premises  once  ad 
mitted,  the  foundations  of  the  colonial  writers,  Berkeley  and 
Keith,  crack  under  them ;  and  even  Stith,  "  the  accurate," 
slightly  suffers.  Virginia,  born  with  a  soul,  passes  down  the 
torch  flared  by  the  rebel  Bacon  in  1676  and  the  rebel  Patrick 
Henry  in  1776.  The  research  of  Edward  Duffield  Neill  and 
the  studies  of  Philip  Alexander  Bruce  have  been  thorough, 
but  Brown  writes  of  the  Seventeenth  Century  as  if  he  had 
lived  in  it.  He  looks  upon  the  books  of  John  Smith  and 
Samuel  Purchas  as  ex  parte  records — Court  documents.  His 
extreme  anti-Smith  bias  is  unfortunate.  It  was  generated 
during  the  long  "John  Smith  Controversy,"  begun  by  Charles 
Deane  in  1860.  But  his  Smith  vagaries  are  of  slight  moment 
in  comparison  with  the  clear  moral  perspective  that  would 
result  should  his  main  proposition  be  sustained.  His  estimate 
of  the  work  of  Sandys,  Southampton,  and  the  Ferrars  has  high 
support.  See  John  Fiske's  "  Old  Virginia  and  her  Neigh 
bors."  See  especially  "  The  Records  of  the  Virginia  Company 
of  London — The  Court  Book  from  the  manuscript  in  the 
Library  of  Congress,"  with  an  introduction  by  Susan  Myra 
Kingsbury.  The  manuscript  Court  Book,  2  vols.,  741  folio 
pages,  was  attested  for  the  Earl  of  Southampton ;  bought  by 
Col.  Byrd ;  used  by  Stith,  and  studied  by  Patrick  Henry's 
friend  Richard  Bland. 

12 


INTRODUCTION 

birds  actually  sang,  and  that  the  people  were  all  alive 
from  the  Potomac  on  the  north  to  the  Nottoway  and 
Roanoke  far  below.  But  direct  documentary  evidence 
is  so  much  more  to  the  point  than  either  generalization 
or  particularization  that  it  is  well  to  bring  forward  a 
contemporary  voucher  as  to  the  human  warmth  and 
liveliness,  not  to  say  friskiness,  of  the  time  we  are 
considering.  When  Washington  was  a  boy  five  years 
old,  this  notice  appeared  in  the  Virginia  Gazette,  pub 
lished  at  Williamsburg : 

"  We  have  advice  from  Hanover  County,  that  on  Saint 
Andrew's  Day,  there  are  to  be  Horse-Races  and  several  other 
Diversions  for  the  Entertainment  of  the  Gentlemen  and  Ladies 
at  the  Old  Field  near  Captain  John  Bickerton's  in  that  county 
(if  permitted  by  the  Hon.  Wm.  Byrd,  esquire,  Proprietor  of 
the  said  Land,)  the  substance  of  which  is  as  follows,  viz. : 

"  It  is  proposed  that  20  Horses  or  Mares  do  run  round  a 
three  miles  Course  for  a  Prize  of  Five  Pounds.  .  .  . 

"  That  a  Hat  of  the  value  of  20  s.  be  cudgelled  for,  and  that 
after  the  first  challenge  made,  the  Drums  are  to  beat  every 
Quarter  of  an  Hour  for  three  Challenges  round  the  ring,  and 
none  to  play  with  their  left  hand. 

"  That  a  Violin  be  played  for  by  20  Fiddlers ;  no  person  to 
have  the  liberty  of  playing  unless  he  bring  a  fiddle  with  him. 
After  the  prize  is  won,  they  are  all  to  play  together  and  each  a 
different  tune,  and  to  be  treated  by  the  company. 

"That  12  Boys,  of  12  years  of  age,  do  run  112  yards,  for  a 
Hat  of  the  cost  of  12  shillings. 

"  That  a  Flag  be  flying  on  said  Day  30  feet  high. 

"That  a  handsome  Entertainment  be  provided  for  the  sub 
scribers  and  their  wives ;  and  such  of  them  as  are  not  so  happy 
as  to  have  wives,  may  treat  any  other  lady. 

"  That  Drums,  Trumpets,  Hautboys,  etc.,  be  provided,  to 
play  at  said  Entertainment. 

"  That  after  Dinner,  the  Royal  Health,  His  Honor  the  Gov 
ernor's,  etc.,  are  to  be  drunk. 

"  That  a  Quire  of  Ballads  be  sung  for  by  a  number  of  Song 
sters,  all  of  them  to  have  Liquor  sufficient  to  clear  their 
Wind-Pipes. 

"  That  a  pair  of  Silver  Buckles  be  wrestled  for  by  a  number 
of  brisk  young  men. 

13 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

"  That  a  pair  of  handsome  Shoes  be  danced  for. 

"  That  a  pair  of  handsome  Silk  Stockings  of  one  Pistole 
value  be  given  to  the  handsomest  young  Country  Maid  that 
appears  in  the  field.  With  many  other  Whimsical  and  Comical 
Diversions,  too  numerous  to  mention.  .  .  ." 

There  is  a  reminder  of  old  England  in  all  this.  One 
may  see  in  fancy  the  day  and  the  people  and  the  scene. 
It  is  such  a  scene  as  might  come  bodily  out  of  Scott, 
Robin  Hood  and  all;  and  it  suggests  the  Shakespearean 
world  as  well.  When  we  reflect  upon  the  possible 
antics  of  those  twenty  merry  fiddlers  of  Hanover,  we 
are  borne  back  to  that  particular  portion  of  Shake 
speare's  world  which  has  to  do  with  merry-making  on 
the  green  and  with  the  impounding  of  a  certain  blithe, 
elusive  spirit  that  droops  and  dies  when  caged  by  any 
body  but  the  great  Englishman  himself.  Long  had  he 
been  gone  when  this  comedy  was  enacted  in  Captain 
John  Bickerton's  "  Old  Field,"  but  if  he  had  been  alive 
and  had  put  the  fiddlers  in  a  play  as  he  did  "  Snout," 
"  Quince,"  and  "  Bottom,"  the  chances  are  they  would 
have  fiddled  on  through  the  ages,  in  spite  of  the  coming 
of  Tarleton's  Dragoons,  and  in  spite  of  the  wrestling 
of  enormous  armies  to  and  fro  during  the  later  years 
when  terrible  things  happened  in  Patrick  Henry's  Han 
over.  For,  a  few  miles  to  the  south,  Richmond  was 
about  to  rise;  and  much  of  the  ground  in  this  vicinity 
was  to  become  battle-ground. 

Just  as  the  sportive  bent  of  these  transplanted  Britons 
reminds  us  of  Shakespeare,  so  the  land-owner  men 
tioned  recalls  the  author  of  "  Henry  Esmond "  and 
"The  Virginians."  "If  permitted  by  the  Hon.  Wm. 
Byrd,  esquire,  Proprietor  of  the  said  Land,"  notes  the 
Gazette.  Colonel  William  Byrd,  son,  namesake,  and 
heir  of  the  founder  of  "  Westover  "  on  the  James,  was 
a  man  after  Thackeray's  own  heart.  He  was  a  char 
acter  ready  to  step  into  a  novel,  and  it  is  a  pity  that 

14 


INTRODUCTION 

Thackeray  missed  him.  Without  changing  a  button 
or  a  buckle  or  a  hair,  Colonel  Byrd,  founder  of  Rich 
mond,  would  have  passed  from  "  preface  "  to  "  finis," 
enlivening  the  book  by  his  wit,  lending  it  charm  by 
his  grace,  humanizing  it  by  his  regard  for  the  welfare 
of  his  fellow-creatures,  and  giving  it  throughout  the 
texture  and  stamp  of  sound  common-sense.  Educated 
in  England,  called  to  the  bar  in  the  Middle  Temple, 
Receiver-General  of  His  Majesty's  revenues  and  Presi 
dent  of  the  Council  of  the  Colony,  this  lord  of  a  hundred 
thousand  acres  was  not  spoiled  by  his  mastery  of  many 
slaves,  by  his  celebrity  as  the  possessor  of  the  greatest 
private  library  in  the  colonies,  by  his  comeliness  of 
person,  or  by  his  pride  as  the  father  of  the  beautiful 
Evelyn  Byrd.  On  the  contrary,  he  took  the  humorist's 
view  of  life  and  made  a  joy  of  it  and  a  joke,  and  doubt 
less  laughed  at  the  twenty  fiddlers  fiddling  in  the  "  Old 
Field "  in  Hanover.  He  should  rank  as  one  of  the 
earliest  of  the  American  literary  lights,  and  would 
unquestionably  do  so  on  a  sharp  and  comprehensive 
readjustment  of  honors.  ''  The  Quakers,"  he  wrote, 
"  flocked  to  this  country  in  shoals,  being  averse  to  go 
to  Heaven  the  same  way  with  the  Bishops."  Again 
we  quote  him:  "I  reached  Shockoe's  (Richmond) 
before  two  o'clock,  and  crossed  the  river  to  the  mills. 
I  had  the  grief  to  find  them  both  stand  as  still,  for  want 
of  water,  as  a  dead  woman's  tongue  for  want  of 
breath."  But  it  is  a  Hanover  County  passage,  in  his 
"  Progress  to  the  Mines,"  that  chiefly  concerns  us  here. 
Thomas  Tinsley,  one  of  his  overseers,  was  with  him. 

"  In  the  evening  [October  7,  1732]  Tinsley  conducted  me  to 
Mrs.  Syme's  house,  where  I  intended  to  take  up  my  quarters. 
This  lady,  at  first  suspecting  I  was  some  lover,  put  on  a  gravity 
which  becomes  a  weed,  but  as  soon  as  she  learned  who  I  was, 
brightened  up  into  an  unusual  cheerfulness  and  serenity.  She 
was  a  portly,  handsome  dame  of  the  family  of  Esau,  and  seemed 

15 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

not  to  pine  too  much  for  the  death  of  her  husband,  who  was  of 
the  family  of  the  Saracens.  He  left  a  son  by  her,  who  has  all 
the  strong  features  of  his  sire,  not  softened  in  the  least  by 
any  of  hers. 

"  This  widow  is  a  person  of  lively  and  cheerful  conversation, 
with  much  less  reserve  than  most  of  her  countrywomen.  It 
becomes  her  well,  and  sets  off  her  other  agreeable  qualities  to 
advantage.  We  tossed  off  a  bottle  of  port,  which  we  relished 
with  a  broiled  chicken." 

On  the  next  day,  he  adds: 

"  I  moistened  my  clay  with  a  quart  of  milk  and  tea,  which  I 
found  altogether  as  great  a  help  to  discourse  as  the  juice  of 
the  grape.  The  courteous  widow  invited  me  to  rest  myself 
there  that  good  day,  and  go  to  church  with  her,  but  I  excused 
myself  by  telling  her  she  would  certainly  spoil  my  devotions. 
Then  she  civilly  entreated  me  to  make  her  house  my  home 
whenever  I  visited  my  plantations,  which  made  me  bow  low 
and  thank  her  very  kindly." 

Thus,  at  the  age  of  fifty-eight,  appeared  the  gallant 
and  sprightly  Colonel  Byrd,  "  the  black  swan  of  his 
family,"  whose  portrait  is  freely  sketched  here  for  a 
double  reason — he  stands  for  the  aristocratic  Virginian 
of  the  period,  and,  in  the  person  of  the  "  portly,  hand 
some  dame,"  he  has  introduced  us  to  the  woman  who, 
three  and  a  half  years  later,  became  the  mother  of 
Patrick  Henry. 

That  there  was  appreciation  of  widows  in  those 
parts  at  that  day,  is  clear  enough  to  any  one  who  dips 
into  Virginia  genealogy.  Such  a  one  assures  us :  "  It 
was  not  an  unusual  thing  for  a  later  husband  to  submit 
for  probate  the  will  of  his  predecessor."  As  in  Bibli 
cal  times,  families  were  large.  Governor  Page's  chil 
dren  numbered  twenty.  General  Robert  E.  Lee's  grand 
father  in  the  maternal  line,  Colonel  Charles  Carter  of 
"  Shirley,"  one  of  Washington's  friends  and  corre 
spondents,  was  the  father  of  twenty-three.  "  King  " 

16 


INTRODUCTION 

Carter's  father,  Colonel  John  Carter  of  Corotoman,  was 
five  times  a  bridegroom ;  and  in  the  same  family  there 
was  a  lady  who,  like  the  "  Wife  of  Bath  "  in  the  "  Can 
terbury  Tales,"  was  five  times  a  bride — five  times  a 
widow. 

These  facts  would  be  satisfying  to  those  who  enjoy 
the  discovery  of  piquancies  in  the  colonial  records,  if 
they  did  not  in  themselves  presuppose  a  sorrowful 
side.  To  realize  this  sad  side,  one  has  but  to  look  upon 
the  portraits  of  handsome  men  in  scarlet  coats  and  great 
white  perukes  and  lovely  ladies  in  like  elegance  of  rai 
ment  who  passed  from  earth  before  their  time.  Swamps 
and  tuckahoe  marshes  under  the  dog-day  sun  bred 
into  the  air  a  something  that  made  both  widows  and 
widowers.  Of  course  there  were  men  of  sense  who 
practised  medicine ;  but  Dr.  Slop  also  rode  about  in  his 
gig,  and,  worse  still,  Dr.  Phlebotomy,  to  whose  zealous 
attentions  the  death  of  no  less  a  man  than  General  Wash 
ington  is  clearly  traceable.  But  whether  the  lowland 
miasma  or  the  doctors  be  to  blame,  the  widow  became 
a  force  and  a  factor  in  colonial  economics.  Like 
tobacco,  she  was  sure  to  be  talked  about  when  court 
met.  The  wink,  the  mischievous  remark,  the  raillery 
of  unmarried  men,  had  a  meaning  that  was  well  under 
stood.  If  the  widow  were  rich,  if  she  were  comely, 
if  she  were  of  repute  for  charm  of  character  or  domes 
tic  skill,  she  was  sure  of  a  suitor  from  near  or  far. 
Frequently  she  united  famous  families  and  great 
estates.  Bantering  gallantly  as  he  journalizes,  Byrd 
accurately  takes  the  tone  of  his  time  in  regard  to  her. 
If,  as  is  most  likely,  he  read  the  passage  in  "  Tristram 
Shandy  "  wherein  the  Widow  Wadman  causes  Uncle 
Toby  to  do  her  the  service  of  peeking  into  her  eye, 
we  may  be  sure  he  paid  to  Laurence  Sterne  the  com 
pliment  of  a  hearty  Westover  laugh. 

It  is  fair  to  assume  that  the  discreet  Mrs.  Syme 
2  17 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

(pronounced  "  Sim  ")  had  the  best  of  reasons  for  giv 
ing  her  supposed  suitor  a  guarded  greeting.  Bereft 
the  year  before  of  a  good  mate  in  the  person  of 
Colonel  John  Syme,*  a  member  from  Hanover  in  the 
House  of  Burgesses,  she  had  already  chosen  her  path 
out  of  widowhood.  He  who,  within  a  few  months, 
was  to  lead  her  thence  lived  under  her  own  roof 
— a  Scotchman,  a  scholar,  a  man  of  character;  and 
not  only  so,  but  a  friend  of  the  lamented  master 
of  "  Studley."  But  it  is  in  order  to  keep  our  Scotch 
scholar  in  abeyance  for  a  few  moments  until  we 
shall  have  said  something  about  this  "  Studley  "  place 
— a  frame  structure,  backed  by  cool  spring-houses 
on  a  minty  slope  and  fronted  by  spacious  and  beautiful 
grounds.  The  approach  was  along  an  avenue  bordered 
by  double  rows  of  locust  trees.  The  plantation  is  on 
the  Tottipottimoy,  made  famous  by  Captain  Smith  and 
more  famous  still  by  Samuel  Butler  in  "  Hudibras." 
Butler,  declaring  that 

"Justice  gives  sentence  many  times 
On  one  man  for  another's  crimes," 

proceeds  to  find  his  proof  in  the  case  of  a  colonial 
cobbler : 

"  This  precious  brother  having  slain 
In  times  of  peace  an  Indian, 
Not  out  of  malice,  but  mere  zeal 
Because  he  was  an  infidel, 
The  mighty  Tottipottimoy 
Sent  to  our  elders  an  envoy 
Complaining  sorely  of  the  breach 
Of  league    .     .    .    ; 

*  In  1731,  the  Widow  Syme  "  petitioned  the  Council  for  pay 
for  the  services  of  her  husband,  Colonel  Syme,  who  died  while 
laying  out  the  boundaries  of  Hanover  and  Louisa."  Colonel 
Syme  was  a  Scotch  immigrant. 

18 


INTRODUCTION 

But  the  wise  "  elders  "  were  loath  to  hang  the  useful 
and  pious  preacher-cobbler ;  so  they 

"  Resolved  to  spare  him ;  yet  to  do 
The  Indian  Hoghan  Moghan,  too, 
Impartial  justice,  in  his  stead  did 
Hang  an  old  weaver  that  was  bed-rid." 

"  Hottitottipottimoy,"  Grant's  soldiers  called  the  stream, 
because  they  found  it  hot  in  the  bordering  bottom-lands. 
The  widow  of  "Studley,"  Sarah  Winston  Syme,  was 
the  daughter  of  Isaac  Winston  and  Mary  Dabney. 
Great  is  genealogy — especially  as  it  enables  one  to 
puncture  the  bubbles  of  such  as  seek  to  put  borrowed 
blue  into  good  red  blood.  Within  a  few  months  past 
there  was  an  attempt  of  the  sort  to  outrage  plain 
Patrick  Henry — to  set  up  a  king  as  his  ancestor.  In 
getting  at  his  genealogical  tap-root,  we  shall  see  what 
nonsense  such  a  notion  is,  and  we  shall  dissipate  at 
least  one  popular  error  concerning  him.  Had  he  Irish 
blood  in  his  veins?  Certainly  he  should  have  had, 
considering  his  Christian  name,  natiye  eloquence,  com 
bative  spirit,  and  whole-souled  readiness  to  risk  his 
all  as  a  rebel.  Yet,  if  there  were  an  Irish  trickle  in  his 
heart,  it  came  percolating  to  him  by  way  of  some  fore 
bear  whose  name  and  race  were  hidden  in  the  merging. 
Through  Mary  Dabney  he  got  good  Huguenot  blood. 
Her  people  belonged  to  a  congregation  of  refugees  who 
colonized  at  Manakin,  on  the  upper  James,  where 
their  leader,  the  clergyman  Claude  Philippe  de  Riche- 
bourg,  found  the  Monacan  Indians  less  ferocious  by  far 
than  had  been  his  kinsmen  and  neighbors  in  the  Chris 
tian  kingdom  of  France.  As  for  the  Hanover  Win- 
stons,  their  old  home  was  in  Yorkshire,  England ;  and 
the  immigrants  had  reached  Virginia  at  a  much  later 
date  than  the  founders  of  the  so-called  "  Tuckahoe " 
families.  Hence  the  Winstons  did  not  belong  to  the 

19 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

cavalier  aristocracy;  they  were  small  landholders — 
sturdy  men  all.  Dolly  Madison  was  Isaac  Winston's 
great-granddaughter,  and  his  descendants  are  at  this 
day  well  abroad  in  many  of  the  States.  But  it  is  Isaac's 
son  William,  or  "  Langloo,"  whose  portrait  must  now 
be  drawn.  He  was  a  fresh  type  of  Virginian — not  a 
tidewater  man,  but  a  lover  of  the  hills  and  the  wilder 
ness.  At  his  hunting  quarter  by  the  mountains,  he 
camped  with  the  Indians;  dressed  as  one;  shot  deer. 
In  a  word,  he  was  a  "  buckskin  " — a  "  long  knife," 
like  Christopher  Gist. 

Nathaniel  Pope,*  a  gallant  light  horseman  of  the 
Revolution,  wrote  this  about  him : 

"  I  have  often  heard  my  father,  who  was  intimately  ac 
quainted  with  William  Winston,  say  that  he  was  the  greatest 
orator  whom  he  had  ever  heard,  Patrick  Henry  excepted;  that 
during  the  last  French  and  Indian  War,  and  soon  after  Brad- 
dock's  defeat,  when  the  militia  were  marched  to  the-  frontiers 
of  Virginia  against  the  enemy,  this  William  Winston  was  a 
lieutenant  of  a  company ;  that  the  men  were  indifferently 
clothed,  without  tents,  and  exposed  to  the  rigour  and  inclem 
ency  of  the  weather,  discovered  great  aversion  to  the  service, 
and  were  anxious  and  even  clamorous  to  return  to  their 
families;  when  this  same  William  Winston,  mounting  a  stump 
(the  common  rostrum,  you  know,  of  the  field  orator  of  Vir 
ginia),  addressed  them  with  such  keenness  of  invective,  and 
declaimed  with  such  force  of  eloquence  on  liberty  and  patriot 
ism,  that  when  he  concluded  the  general  cry  was :  '  Let  us 
march  on !  Lead  us  against  the  enemy !  '  and  they  were  now 
willing,  nay  anxious,  to  encounter  all  those  difficulties  and  dan 
gers  which,  but  a  few  moments  before,  had  almost  produced 
a  mutiny." 

Upon  reading  this,  he  who  believes  in  transmitted 
tendencies  is  apt  to  say :  "  Now  we  know  where  our 

*  This  Nathaniel  Pope,  of  "  Chilton,"  Hanover  County,  was 
mortally  wounded  in  a  duel,  near  Taylorsville ;  "  and  died 
smoking  his  pipe,  having  requested  his  son  not  to  prosecute 
the  matter." 

20 


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MI'l^ 


INTRODUCTION 

Patrick  got  his  trick  of  tongue ;  "  but  let  us  suspend 
judgment  and  pass  for  a  few  moments  across  the  water 
into  the  presence  of  Henry,  Lord  Brougham,  and  hear 
what  he  has  to  urge  with  respect  to  the  origin  of  his 
own  oratorical  fire.  Oddly  enough,  at  the  very  outset 
of  Brougham's  "  Life  and  Times  "  we  meet  with  another 
Widow  Syme,  his  grandmother,  sister  to  the  Scottish 
historian  Robertson.  Imagine  this  "  Mally  "  Robertson, 
a  beauty,  sitting  in  a  garden  on  a  summer  day;  her 
surprise  when  a  swarm  of  honey-bees  clustered  in 
masses  upon  her  head,  neck,  and  shoulders;  her  sensa 
tions,  impelling  to  terror;  her  self-control,  enabling  her 
to  remain  motionless,  and  her  relief  when  they  once 
more  took  wing.  At  her  house  in  Edinburgh,  when 
she  had  become  the  Widow  Syme,  there  one  day 
appeared  the  heir  of  Brougham,  grieving  because  of 
the  sudden  death,  on  her  wedding  eve,  of  his  cousin  and 
bride-elect,  Mary  Whelpdale,  "  the  last  of  a  perfectly 
pure  Saxon  race."  But  the  distracted  lover  married 
Eleanor,  daughter  of  the  Widow  Syme;  and  Lord 
Brougham,  felicitating  himself  with  na'ive  egotism  upon 
his  escape  from  Saxon  mediocrity,  concludes :  "  I,  at 
least,  owe  much  to  the  Celtic  blood  which  my  mother 
brought  from  the  clans  of  Struan  and  Kinloch-Moi- 
dart." 

Now  Jean  Robertson,  an  aunt  of  "  Mally  "  Robert 
son  Syme,  married  Alexander  Henry.  Their  son  John, 
born  in  Aberdeen,  became  the  second  husband  of  the 
mistress  of  "  Studley  "  in  Hanover  and  was  the  father 
of  our  Patrick. 

So  here  is  a  pretty  problem  in  heredity :  Did  the 
American  orator  inherit  his  peculiar  genius  by  way  of 
the  Winston  line,  or  did  he  get  it  through  the  Robert 
son  strain,  which  put  such  vehemence  and  power  into 
the  tongue  of  Lord  Brougham  as  to  enable  him  to 
destroy  the  slave-trade  of  Great  Britain?  Or  may 

21 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

there  not  have  been  a  blending  of  qualities  inherited 
from  both?  At  any  rate,  we  here  find  the  Celt,  if  not 
the  Irishman,  in  Patrick  Henry. 

For  some  reason,  John  Henry  does  not  pulsate  under 
the  biographer's  hand.  Not  that  he  is  shadowy — the 
outlines  of  his  forty  years  in  Hanover  are  as  clear  as 
need  be.  We  have  assurance  that  he  was  county  sur 
veyor,  colonel  of  militia,  presiding  magistrate,  adherent 
of  the  Anglican  Church,  and  a  faithful  supporter  of  the 
regal  government.  "  Respectable,"  "  plain,"  "  solid  " 
— all  are  used  in  describing  him.  He  "  knew  his  Horace 
better  than  his  Bible  " ;  and  he  must  have  known  some 
thing  about  the  Bible  too,  for  when  he  got  into  an 
argument  on  the  subject  of  eternal  punishment,  he 
turned  to  his  Greek  Testament  and  disputed  from  the 
depths  of  that.  He  made  a  map  of  Virginia.  He 
brought  up  his  two  sons  and  seven  daughters  *  in  the 
way  they  should  go.  He  did  much  besides ;  yet  his  wig 
is  never  sufficiently  in  disarray  to  satisfy  a  seeker  after  a 
strong  portrait.  When  George  Whitefield,  the  pioneer 
Methodist  preacher  and  revivalist,  whom  Chesterfield 
pronounced  the  most  eloquent  man  he  had  ever  heard, 
was  in  Virginia,  he  saw  a  little  girl  staring  at  him  as  if 
he  were  unreal  to  her.  Thereupon  the  kind  man,  who 
had  been  through  much,  stooped,  lifted  his  wig,  and, 

*  Genealogists  show  that  more  than  seventy  substantial 
Southern  families  are  in  cousinship  through  the  ramifications 
of  the  John  and  Sarah  stock.  They  are  spread  wide  over 
Dixieland  from  old  Roanoke  to  the  Rockies.  General  Joseph 
E.  Johnston  was  a  descendant.  So  was  the  wife  of  General 
Wade  Hampton.  R.  A.  Brock  says :  "  In  vigor  of  intellect 
in  its  various  exemplifications,  in  true  manhood,  and  in  illus 
trious  and  material  service  in  the  one  sex,  and  in  the  typical 
exhibition  of  womanly  graces  and  virtues  characteristic  of 
Virginia  and  the  South  in  the  other,  no  citizen  of  the  Old 
Dominion  within  its  annals  or  traditions  has  been  more 
honored  in  his  descendants,  to  the  present  generation,  than 
John  Henry." 

22 


INTRODUCTION 

pointing  to  a  gash  in  his  scalp,  said :  "  See !  There  is 
where  the  brick-bat  hit  me."  We  may  not  lift  the 
wig  of  John  Henry;  but  later  in  these  pages  we  shall 
find  him  in  a  dramatic  situation,  and  may  even  now 
behold  him  in  this  bit  of  a  sketch  by  Nathaniel  Pope : 

"  There  are  those  yet  alive  who  have  seen  him  at  the  head 
of  his  regiment,  celebrating  the  birthday  of  George  III.  with 
as  much  enthusiasm  as  his  son  Patrick  afterward  displayed  in 
resisting  the  encroachments  of  that  monarch." 

John  Burk  made  a  curious  error  in  his  "  History  of 
Virginia."  Misled  by  our  Patrick's  custom  of  writing 
"  junior  "  after  his  name,  Burk  said  that  Patrick  was 
the  son  of  Patrick.  The  "  senior "  in  the  case  was 
Colonel  John  Henry's  brother  Patrick,*  also  bred  in 
the  old  university  town  of  Aberdeen,  who,  twelve  days 
after  his  namesake's  birth,  became  rector  of  St.  Paul's 
parish,  Hanover.  The  glebe  tract  of  "  Mount  Pleas 
ant  "  was  near  "  Mount  Brilliant  " — later  known  as 
"  The  Retreat " — whither  Colonel  John  Henry  soon 
removed;  and  the  two  lived  in  tender  attachment  and 
close  brotherhood  for  the  rest  of  their  days.  Each 
spoke  with  the  Scotch  accent.  Colonel  John  was  amia 
ble;  the  reverend  Patrick  was  irascible. 

*  Patrick  was  a  common  name  in  Scotland.  From  that 
country,  for  instance,  came  Colonel  Patrick  Ferguson,  the  best 
sabreur  in  the  British  army  during  the  Revolution.  He  was 
killed  at  King's  Mountain. 


II 

BY    NO    MEANS    A    MODEL    BOY 

As  these  pages  multiply,  it  will  be  remarked  that 
May  and  June  were  peculiarly  eventful  months  in  the 
life  of  Patrick  Henry.  He  was  born  at  "  Studley," 
sixteen  miles  from  Richmond,  on  the  2Qth  of  May, 
1736.  When  he  was  a  few  months  old,  his  parents 
removed  to  "  Mount  Brilliant "  farm,  twenty-two  miles 
from  Richmond.  Near  the  house  ran  the  South  Anna 
River.  Rocky  Mills,  not  far  away,  gave  a  name  to  the 
neighborhood.  Forests  then  covered  the  country. 

All  of  Sarah  Syme  Henry's  boys  were  born  at  "  Stud- 
ley  " — John  Syme,  William  Henry,  and  Patrick  Henry. 
At  "  Mount  Brilliant "  so  many  daughters  were  born  to 
her  that  she  must  have  feared  lest  she  should  use  up 
all  the  good  old  feminine  names — Jane,  Sarah,  Susan 
nah,  Mary,  Anne,  Elizabeth,  and  Lucy. 

There  were  no  free  schools  in  Hanover;  and  the  pay 
schools  were  poor.  Anybody  could  teach.  One  merely 
put  up  his  sign,  "  John  Jones,  Teacher  " ;  placed  some 
benches  in  a  room ;  cut  a  hickory  switch ;  and  all  was 
ready  for  the  torture  and  the  flogging.  Judge  John 
Tyler  used  to  say  of  a  teacher  of  the  type :  "  It  was  a 
wonder  he  did  not  whip  all  the  senses  out  of  his 
scholars."  A  few,  however,  were  efficient.  Such,  for 
instance,  was  Devereux  Jarratt,  who  became  a  celebrated 
clergyman.  He  was  of  a  stratum  of  society  below  tne 
Winstons,  Dabneys,  and  Henrys,  and  far  below  the 
"  Tuckahoes."  "  A  periwig  in  those  days,"  says  Jarratt, 
"  was  a  distinguishing  badge  of  the  gentlefolk,  and 
when  I  saw  a  man  with  a  wig  on,  riding  the  road  near 
our  house,  it  would  so  alarm  my  fears  and  give  me  such 

24 


BY  NO  MEANS  A  MODEL  BOY 

a  disagreeable  feeling  that  I  dare  say  I  would  run  off 
as  for  my  life."  One  of  his  boyhood  duties  was  to  take 
care  of  game-cocks  and  get  them  ready  for  a  fight. 
Racing,  dancing,  and  card-playing  were  common  Sun 
day  amusements.  Jarratt  taught  in  Hanover,  but 
probably  did  not  have  our  Patrick  as  a  pupil.  That 
Patrick  attended  "  a  common  English  school "  until 
he  was  ten  years  old  we  learn  from  the  memorandum 
of  Colonel  Samuel  Meredith,*  who  was  older  by  four 
years,  who  lived  but  four  miles  away,  and  who  married 
Patrick's  sister  Jane.  Meredith  adds :  "  He  never 
went  to  any  other  school,  public  or  private,  but  remained 
with  his  father,  who  was  his  only  tutor."  He  learned 
some  Latin  and  a  little  Greek,  and  got  a  good  ground 
ing  in  mathematics.  At  fifteen  he  was  "  well  versed 
in  both  ancient  and  modern  history."  He  was  "  quiet." 
He  was  "thoughtful,"  "mild,"  "benevolent,"  "humane." 
He  was  fond  of  his  gun.  Being  housed,  when  about 
twelve,  because  of  a  broken  collar-bone,  he  learned 
to  play  on  the  flute.  He  could  handle  the  fiddle-bow. 
Careless  as  to  outside  garb,  he  "  was  unusually  atten 
tive  in  having  clean  linen  and  stockings."  He  loved 
his  sisters,  and  was  a  dutiful  son. 

Now,  if  this  be  not  a  flattering  leaf  from  the  family 
album,  where  did  tradition  and  William  Wirt  find  their 
good-for-nothing  boy  Patrick?  In  preparing  his  eulo 
gistic  "  Life  " — a  labor  of  love  for  many  years — what 
motive  could  Wirt  have  had  in  writing  his  hero  down 
as  an  idler  and  a  truant?  This  is  the  way  Wirt  treats 
the  boy: 

"  He  was  too  idle  to  gain  any  solid  advantages  from  the 
Opportunities  which  were  thrown  in  his  way.  He  was  passion 
ately  addicted  to  the  sports  of  the  field,  and  could  not  support 
the  confinement  and  toil  which  education  required.  Hence, 

*  See  Appendix  A  for  Meredith's  detailed  statement. 
25 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

instead  of  system  or  any  semblance  of  regularity  in  his  studies, 
his  efforts  were  always  desultory,  and  became  more  and  more 
rare,  until  at  length,  when  the  hour  of  his  school  exercises 
arrived,  Patrick  was  scarcely  ever  to  be  found.  He  was  in 
the  forest  with  his  gun,  or  over  the  brook  with  his  angle-rod; 
and,  in  these  frivolous  occupations,  when  not  controlled  by 
the  authority  of  his  father  (which  was  rarely  exercised)  he 
would,  it  is  said,  spend  whole  days  and  weeks,  with  an  appetite 
rather  whetted  than  cloyed  by  enjoyment.  His  school-fellows, 
having  observed  his  growing  passion  for  these  amusements, 
and  having  remarked  that  its  progress  was  not  checked  either 
by  the  want  of  companions  or  the  want  of  success,  have  fre 
quently  watched  his  movements  to  discover,  if  they  could,  the 
secret  source  of  that  delight  which  they  seemed  to  afford  him. 
But  they  made  no  discovery  which  led  them  to  any  other  con 
clusion  than  (to  use  their  own  expression)  '  that  he  loved 
idleness  for  its  own  sake.' " 

Again  does  Mr.  Wirt  hold  up  the  lad  to  shame : 

"  His  person  is  represented  as  having  been  coarse,  his  man 
ners  uncommonly  awkward,  his  dress  slovenly,  his  conversa 
tion  very  plain,  his  aversion  to  study  invincible,  and  his  facul 
ties  almost  entirely  benumbed  by  indolence.  No  persuasion 
could  bring  him  to  read  or  work.  On  the  contrary,  he  ran 
wild  in  the  forest,  like  one  of  the  aborigines  of  the  country, 
and  divided  his  life  between  the  dissipation  and  uproar  of  the 
chase  and  the  languor  of  inaction." 

A  little  more  and  Patrick  would  have  been  a  Pamun- 
key,  indeed !  On  his  hunting  trips  he  must  have  met 
some  of  the  Pamunkey  tribe,  for,  as  Thomas  Jefferson 
tells  us,  they  lived  just  down  the  river,  on  land  "  so 
encompassed  by  water  that  a  gate  shuts  in  the  whole." 

But  Colonel  Meredith's  character  of  the  boy  stands 
strong  against  William  Wirt's  fanciful  estimate.  The 
manuscript  narrative  of  Meredith,  as  taken  down  by 
Judge  William  H.  Cabell  and  sent  to  Wirt,  is  before 
us  at  this  moment.  Wirt  must  have  had  it  in  his 
possession  when  he  wrote  his  book.  Why,  then,  did 
he  not  weave  the  Meredith  thread  into  the  texture  of 

26 


BY  NO  MEANS  A  MODEL  BOY 

his  memoir?  It  may  be  that  he  had  talked  with  Han 
over  people  who  had  convinced  him  that  the  true  Patrick 
was  a  different  boy  from  the  one  depicted  in  the  Mere 
dith  notes;  but  the  probability  is  that  Wirt  could  not 
resist  his  impulse  towards  "  artistic  romancing."  He  was 
confessedly  a  lover  of  the  picturesque.  What  a  laugh 
ing-stock  Parson  Weems  had  made  of  himself  by  draw 
ing  young  George  Washington  as  a  human  paragon ! 
It  would  not  do  to  deify  Patrick  Henry  so.  On  the 
contrary,  the  man  would  be  better  liked  if  given  a 
touch  of  human  frailty.  The  proportions  must  be 
preserved.  Later  eulogy  would  be  more  effective  if  it 
should  be  prefaced  by  harmless  detraction.  Here  pres 
ent  was  the  great  drama  of  liberty,  and  a  renowned 
actor  would  soon  leap  upon  the  boards;  why  not  begin 
with  a  shock,  a  surprise,  a  justifiable  belittlement  ? 
Certainly  there  was  opportunity  enough  for  an  original 
and  striking  picture  of  the  great  orator's  Hanover  life. 
"  Yes,"  said  the  old  Virginians ;  "  that  was  his  reputa 
tion — he  was  lazy  in  his  youth — he  was  a  genius ;  " 
and  Wirt  half  believed  them.  In  spite  of  the  Meredith 
contradiction,  it  suited  him  to  believe  them.  So,  with 
a  polite  acknowledgment  of  its  receipt,  he  passed  over 
the  letter  forwarded  by  Judge  Cabell  because  its  colors 
failed  to  blend  with  his  own,  and  then  he  gave  so 
positive  a  picture  of  young  Patrick's  indolence  that  it 
lingers  in  the  public  mind  to-day.  "  At  fifteen,"  writes 
A.  G.  Bradley,  echoing  Wirt,  "he  [Patrick]  was  a 
wastrel  and  an  idler,  a  reputed  hater  of  books  and  work, 
a  loud-tongued  joker  at  the  village  tavern." 

Wirt  follows  up  his  strictures  with  a  passage  amus 
ingly  characteristic  of  the  times  in  which  he  wrote : 

"  Let  not  the  youthful  reader,  however,  deduce  from  the 
example  of  Mr.  Henry  an  argument  in  favor  of  indolence  and 
the  contempt  of  study.  Let  him  remember  that  the  powers 
which  surmounted  the  disadvantage  of  those  early  habits  were 

27 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

such  as  very  rarely  appear  upon  this  earth.  Let  him  remember, 
too,  how  long  the  genius,  even  of  Mr.  Henry,  was  kept  down 
and  hidden  from  the  public  view,  by  the  sorcery  of  those 
pernicious  habits ;  through  what  years  of  poverty  and  wretched 
ness  they  doomed  him  to  struggle;  and  let  him  remember 
that  at  length,  when  in  the  zenith  of  his  glory,  Mr.  Henry 
himself  had  frequent  occasions  to  deplore  the  consequences  of 
his  early  neglect  of  literature,  and  to  bewail  '  the  ghosts  of  his 
departed  hours.' " 

This  is  moralizing  in  the  true  early  Nineteenth  Cen 
tury  style.  Contrast  Parson  Weems'  goody-goody 
stories  and  William  Wirt's  moralizing  with  the  treat 
ment  of  boy-nature  by  a  Meredith  who  is  unconnected 
with  the  old-time  Virginia  Meredith,  as  well  as  with 
America  itself — George  Meredith,  author  of  "  The 
Ordeal  of  Richard  Feverel."  There  are  no  apologies 
in  the  books  of  this  latter-day  analyst  of  the  heart  of 
youth.  The  truth  as  told  by  George  Meredith  about 
boys  is  not  softened  in  the  least.  It  is  painful  in  its 
exactitude.  A  boy  may  be  both  brute  and  angel.  He 
has  in  him  the  essence  of  nobility,  but  also  he  is  a 
born  barbarian.  Loving  his  dog,  he  will  caress  the 
creature  and  make  much  of  him ;  but  he  will  wantonly 
pull  that  dog's  tail  before  he  is  through.  George  Mere 
dith,  who  knows  the  boy  by  heart,  would  have  gloried 
in  the  lad  of  the  Hanover  forests. 

Not  that  Wirt  was  lacking  in  fondness  for  boys.  It 
was  not  every  dignitary  who  would  take  off  his  clothes, 
as  he  did  while  Attorney-General  of  the  United  States, 
plunge  into  the  swimming-pool  at  St.  John's  College, 
Annapolis,  and  engage  the  students  in  a  "  battle  of 
splash "  till  his  radiant  face  and  curly  white  head 
ducked  in  token  of  defeat.  Indeed,  after  what  has 
been  said  in  dispraise  of  William  Wirt,*  one  pauses 

*  Wirt  was  a  wit,  a  conversationalist,  a  maker  of  impromptu 
epigrams.  As  a  young  man,  he  was  gay.  He  married  a  daugh- 

28 


BY  NO  MEANS  A  MODEL  BOY 

to  think  of  the  man.  His  whole  life  comes  up ;  and  the 
slight,  but  necessary,  strictures  here  made  take  on  a 
paltry  aspect.  They  seem  tantamount  to  a  calumny  upon 
as  charming  a  character  as  could  be  found  in  American 
letters  or  politics.  One  feels  it  a  pity  even  to  task  him 
for  his  fault  of  floridity — for  writing  a  "  splendid 
novel,"  when  it  was  his  duty  to  stick  to  facts.  Per 
sonally,  how  sincere  he  was,  how  brilliant,  how  able! 
If  his  Horace  were  always  in  his  pocket,  there  was 
always  in  his  head  a  counterbalancing  sense  of  humor, 
saving  him  from  pedantry.  Emulous  of  the  great  prac 
titioners  and  orators  of  his  age,  he  almost  reached  their 
height.  With  high  literary  ambition,  he  stands  a  typi 
cal  figure  among  our  American  Amiels  of  his  day— 
those  witty  and  genial  and  learned  and  lovable  souls 
who  left  behind  them  little  save  the  record  of  their 
aspirations. 

And  now  seems  the  time  to  say  what  should  be  said 
somewhere  in  this  volume — that  Patrick  Henry's  son 
John  *  named  a  son  of  his  own  William  Wirt  Henry, 

ter  of  Colonel  Robert  Gamble,  of  Gamble's  hill,  Richmond. 
One  summer  morning  early  Colonel  Gamble,  on  business  bent, 
entered  Wirt's  office.  Wirt,  who  had  been  up  all  night  with 
boon  companions,  was  armed  with  a  sheet-iron  blower  and  a 
poker  and  was  reciting  "  Falstaff's  "  account  of  the  battle  with 
the  men  in  buckram.  Colonel  Gamble  bowed  to  his  prospective 
son-in-law,  and  withdrew. 

*  Colonel  John  Henry  was  four  years  old  when  his  father 
died.  He  was  chagrined  when  he  first  read  William  Wirt's 
book.  He  felt  that  Wirt  should  have  visited  Red  Hill  before 
writing  it,  and  that  he  should  have  talked  with  two  of  Patrick 
Henry's  sisters,  who  were  then  living.  He  also  realized 
that  Jefferson  had  unduly  influenced  Wirt.  On  the  other 
hand,  John  Henry  admired  the  "  Sketches "  for  the  qualities 
that  popularized  them ;  and  showed  his  gratitude  to  Wirt 
in  many  ways.  William  Wirt  Henry  inherited  the  duty  of 
clearing  his  grandfather's  record.  His  first  notable  paper, 
"  Character  and  Public  Career  of  Patrick  Henry,"  was  pub- 

29 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

who,  by  research,  by  sifting,  by  pious  continuity  of 
labor  through  many  years,  rescued  and  authenticated 
much  matter  of  weight  and  consequence  concerning 
the  life  of  the  great  orator.  But  his  task  was  difficult. 
When  Patrick  Henry  had  grown  great,  he  did  not  con 
cern  himself  about  the  rungs  of  the  ladder  by  which 
he  had  climbed.  He  left  but  one  important  paper.  As 
he  did  not  foresee  that  futurity  would  wish  to  know 
whether  he  took  his  father's  "  birchings "  stoically, 
whether  he  held  his  nose  when  he  dived  in  the  South 
Anna  swimming-hole,  or  whether  he  could  perform 
startling  acrobatic  feats  in  some  grapevine  gymnasium 
far  in  the  woods,  he  made  no  record  of  such  things. 
He  probably  shared  Chief-Justice  John  Marshall's 
dread  of  biographers.  "  I  hope  to  God  they  will  let 
me  alone  till  I  am  dead,"  said  Marshall,  within  Wirt's 
hearing — which  was  not  altogether  complimentary  to 
Wirt. 

Many  Hanover  people  told  Nathaniel  Pope  of 
Patrick's  liking  for  the  woods  and  of  his  playful  spirit. 
"  Colonel  Charles  Dabney,"  says  Pope,  "  has  described 
to  me  the  place  on  the  South  Anna  where  Patrick  when 
a  boy  would  overset  the  canoe  in  which  they  were 
crossing  the  river,  and  which  the  Colonel  attributed  to 
accident  until  he  remarked  that  whenever  an  accident 
of  this  kind  happened,  himself  and  brother  had  their 
clothes  on,  and  Patrick  Henry,  under  some  pretext  or 
other,  was  generally  divested  of  his."  Again  Pope 
says :  "  Henry  when  a  boy  took  great  pleasure  in  the 
company  of  an  agile  fellow,  a  dependant  of  his,  who 

lished  in  the  Richmond,  Va.,  Dispatch,  in  1867 ;  other  papers 
followed ;  and  in  1891  he  published  his  three-volume  "  Patrick 
Henry :  Life,  Correspondence,  and  Speeches."  It  is  a  work  of 
1,946  pages.  William  Wirt  Henry  was  a  thorough  student  of 
early  Virginia  history.  He  was  never  in  robust  health.  He 
died  in  1900. 

30 


BY  NO  MEANS  A  MODEL  BOY 

was  famous  for  performing  extraordinary  feats  of 
dexterity  and  activity.  He  would  often  give  him  a 
pistareen  to  climb  a  tall  pine  in  the  neighborhood  with 
his  feet  foremost,  to  the  admiration  of  the  beholders ; 
and  sometimes  he  would  designedly  tangle  his  fishing 
lines  and  get  them  into  the  hardest  knots  to  observe 
with  what  dexterity  this  little  fellow  would  untangle 
and  loose  them." 

Moreover,  the  traditions  of  Red  Hill,  where  Patrick 
Henry  spent  his  last  days,  agree  with  those  of  Hanover 
that  he  was  particularly  given  to  roaming  the  woods. 
"  Jack  White,"  a  Red  Hill  servant,  half  Indian  and  an 
expert  woodcraftsman,  once  asked  his  master  to  tell 
him  of  the  boyhood  sports  on  the  South  Anna.  Henry 
said  to  "  Jack  White  "  that  his  object  in  his  solitary 
rambles  was  to  "  learn  the  language  of  the  birds." 
Knowing  no  better,  he  fancied  that  if  he  should  listen 
patiently  and  think  a  long  time,  he  could  at  last  learn 
what  the  birds  meant  when  they  sang.  The  mocking 
bird  could  call  like  a  whippoorwill,  caw  like  a  crow, 
scream  like  a  jay-bird,  or  cackle  like  a  hen.  What  did  it 
all  signify?  he  had  asked  himself,  and  so  had  set  about 
the  task  of  solving  the  puzzle. 

One  of  his  boyhood  joys  was  to  sit  in  a  shady  place 
and  watch  the  cork  on  his  fishing  line.  Or,  flat  on  his 
back,  with  his  hands  clasped  under  his  head  and  his 
legs  crossed  in  air,  he  would  watch  the  buzzards  in 
their  gyrations  a  full  mile  aloft.  Considering  the  native 
wholesomeness  and  acuteness  of  his  mind,  he  was  prob 
ably  learning  more  than  he  could  have  gathered  from 
all  the  Jarratts  in  the  colony.  For  who  shall  say  that 
he  was  not  more  studious  while  thus  prone  upon  his 
back  than  if  he  had  been  bench-fast  in  a  school-room, 
thumbing  a  dull  book?  His  eyes  were  sharp;  his 
memory  was  keen ;  his  whole  mind  plastic,  receptive, 
retentive.  Like  John  in  the  Wilderness,  he  saw  and 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

absorbed.  "  Repent !  "  thought  John,  again  and  again. 
What  our  Patrick  thought  is  best  shown  in  what  he 
said  and  did  when  it  came  his  turn  to  do  and  say.  The 
river  ran  by;  the  life  of  the  forest  was  with  him;  the 
Book  of  Nature  was  open.  Many  of  her  laws  were  in 
operation  before  his  eyes.  Her  precision  of  workman 
ship  ;  her  fidelity,  as  seen  each  spring  when  back  to  their 
places  came  old  bird-friends  and  old  flower-friends ; 
her  bounty — a  marvellous  thing;  her  fateful  quali 
ties  of  disfavor  and  ferocity;  her  majesty,  as  beheld 
above  the  dark  pine  masses  on  a  sparkling  night — these 
truths,  laws,  beauties,  must  have  been  manifest  to  him 
and  absorbed  by  him ;  and  this  life  he  led,  this  schooling, 
must  have  made  of  him  something  truer,  something 
saner,  something  freer  and  stronger  than  he  would 
have  been  if  he  had  leaned  unduly  upon  what  man 
kind  puts  into  books. 

Yet  books  and  bookish  men  had  not  a  little  to  do  with 
Patrick  Henry's  development.  Even  if  Mr.  Wirt  be 
right  as  to  the  boy's  truancy,  there  were  rainy  days 
then  as  now,  and  by  no  possibility  could  Patrick 
always  have  escaped  the  sound  of  his  father's  voice — 
the  unctuous  Scotch  twist  and  twang  as  the  Aberdeen 
dominie  construed  Latin  and  Greek  with  his  grammar- 
school  pupils.  A  traveller  of  the  period  tells  of  the 
delight  he  felt  when  once  he  came  upon  a  great  number 
of  Virginia  boys  out  on  the  green,  under  the  trees, 
with  the  wild  blue  mountains  in  full  view,  going  over 
their  Greek  in  melodious  voices.  As  befits  the  idyllic 
sketch,  the  master  sat  in  silence ;  and  the  music  of  the 
verb  "  tupto,"  the  traveller  avows,  lingered  long  in 
his  ears.  Doubtless  there  was  an  enticing  side  likewise 
to  the  "  Mount  Brilliant "  school ;  and,  when  Uncle 
Patrick  came,  the  air  at  times  must  have  been  filled  with 
the  sound  of  learning.  Nor  ought  we  to  lose  sight  of 
the  fact  that  there  was  a  special  reason  why  the  Gentle- 

32 


BY  NO  MEANS  A  MODEL  BOY 

man's  Magazine  should  be  read  at  "  Mount  Brilliant." 
Another  Aberdeen  scholar,  David  Henry,  a  cousin  of 
John  and  Patrick  Senior,  was  its  co-editor.  On  one 
occasion  our  Patrick  said,  within  the  hearing  of  Gov 
ernor  John  Page :  "  Naiteral  parts  is  better  than  all 
the  larnin'  upon  yearth ;  "  and  this  expression  has  been 
cited  in  proof  of  his  illiteracy.  But  Patrick  could 
mimic  a  man  to  perfection,  and  possibly  the  Governor 
was  not  quick  to  see  a  joke ;  or  possibly  Page  took  out 
the  honest  "  are "  and  interpolated  the  mischievous 
"  is."  Virginians  in  that  day,  as  later,  had  a  way  of 
their  own  with  words.  The  polished  Edmund  Pendle- 
ton  pronounced  "  scarcely  "  "  scaisely."  Said  the  irri 
table  John  Randolph  of  Roanoke  to  a  woman  who  was 
a  long  time  serving  his  breakfast : 

"  Why  don't  you  make  that  coffee?  " 

"  I  wuz  a-makin'  it." 

"  You  wuz  a-makin'  it !  Whoever  said  '  wuz  '  but 
you  and  the  Chief-Justice !  " 

According  to  John  Adams,  Patrick  Henry  said  that, 
at  fifteen,  he  had  read  Virgil  and  Livy  in  the  original. 
Judge  Hugh  Nelson  reports  that,  when  older,  Henry 
read  a  translation  of  Livy  once  a  year,  Henry  himself 
having  so  stated.  Hence  it  is  allowable  to  surmise  that 
liberty  and  republicanism  got  into  his  head  by  way  of 
old  Rome,  as  well  as  by  breathing  the  breath  of  that 
something  which  dwelt  in  the  wilderness. 

Whether  our  Patrick,  if  he  had  lived,  could  have 
read  the  little  Latin  "  Life  "  of  him  by  Dr.  Nathan 
Covington  Brooks  ( 1864)  is  uncertain ;  but  we  think 
the  orator  would  have  had  a  good  laugh  over  "  '  Casar 
habuit  suum  Brutum,  Carohts  Primus  suum  Crom- 
wellum,  et  Georgius  Tertius — '(clamor  ingens:  'Procli 
tic!  Proditio!')"  etc. 

Bearing  in  mind  that  "  Tristram  Shandy "  did  not 
appear  until  1760,  it  is  interesting  to  note  how  the  book 
3  33 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

impressed    young    Patrick    Henry.      Captain    George 
Dabney,  a  neighbor,  says: 

"  He  [Patrick]  was  delighted  with  the  '  Life  and  Opinions 
of  Tristram  Shandy,'  which  I  have  known  him  to  read  several 
hours  together,  lying  with  his  back  upon  a  bed.  He  had  a 
most  retentive  memory,  making  what  he  read  his  own.  I  never 
heard  him  quote  verbatim  any  passages  from  history  or  poetry, 
but  he  would  give  you  the  fact  or  sentiment  in  his  own 
expressive  language." 

"  Tristram  "  had  other  admirers  in  those  parts  about 
that  time.  One  of  these  was  Dr.  John  Eustace,  of 
Wilmington,  N.  C.,  who,  having  sent  the  author  of 
the  book  a  curious  "  Shandean  "  cane,  received  the  fol 
lowing  acknowledgment  from  Laurence  Sterne : 

"  Your  walking-stick  is  in  no  sense  more  Shandaic  than  in 
that  of  its  having  more  handles  than  one.  The  parallel  breaks 
only  in  this,  that  in  using  the  stick  every  one  will  take  the 
handle  which  suits  his  convenience.  In  '  Tristram  Shandy ' 
the  handle  is  taken  which  suits  their  passions,  their  ignorance, 
or  their  sensibility.  There  is  so  little  true  feeling  in  the  herd 
of  the  world  that  I  wish  I  could  have  got  an  act  of  Parlia 
ment,  when  the  books  first  appeared,  '  that  none  but  wise  men 
should  look  into  them.'  It  is  too  much  to  write  books  and 
find  heads  to  understand  them." 

And  now  we  may  conclude  that  while  Patrick  Henry 
was  by  no  means  a  model  for  the  youth  of  the  land, 
he  was  not  as  undeserving  as  Mr.  Wirt  and  tradition 
have  proclaimed.  He  was  a  normal  boy,  who  liked 
work  as  little  as  a  colt  likes  the  cart.  Unaware  of  his 
own  latent  powers,  he  did  as  other  boys  in  Hanover 
were  doing — went  barefoot  in  summer,  fished,  swam, 
sang,  fought,  did  "  chores,"  and  in  fall  and  winter 
roamed  the  forests  with  his  flintlock.  Thus  his  boy 
hood  falls  short  of  something  exemplary  and  inspiring 
when  contrasted  with  that  of  such  a  Virginia  celebrity, 

34 


BY  NO  MEANS  A  MODEL  BOY 

for  example,  as  Edmund  Pendleton,  who  ploughed  all 
day  and  busied  himself  with  books  at  night,  or  with 
that  of  any  one  of  a  hundred  self-made  American 
heroes  it  would  be  possible  to  name.  We  all  keep  in 
mind  a  picture  of  young  "  Abe  "  Lincoln  down  on  the 
hearthstone  with  his  nose  in  a  book  and  the  fire  flick 
ering;  but  there  is  no  such  picture  of  young  Patrick. 
He  was  just  a  normal  boy;  and  he  had  a  good  time 
with  his  rod  and  gun — an  excellent  time. 


35 


Ill 

STRUGGLES — NINE  YEARS  ON  THE  WRONG  ROAD 

WITH  so  many  daughters  under  the  "  Mount  Bril 
liant  "  roof,  it  was  natural,  if  imprudent,  that  Colonel 
John  Henry  and  his  wife  should  push  their  unpractised 
sons  prematurely  into  the  workaday  world.  Not  lack 
of  parental  affection,  but  excess  of  it,  is  indicated  in 
this.  Possibly  the  elders  were  troubled  because  Patrick 
was  so  fond  of  hounds  and  horn,  but  the  greater  likeli 
hood  is  that  they  were  in  distress  lest  William — 
"  Langloo  "  Winston's  namesake — should  go  the  wrong 
road.  "  Dissipated  "  is  the  word  applied  to  William 
by  the  gossips  of  Hanover.  As  his  beard  grew,  he 
acquired  an  estate ;  served  as  a  patriot  soldier ;  repre 
sented  Fluvanna  in  the  Assembly,  and,  like  his  father, 
was  called  "  Colonel  "  ;  but  at  this  time  he  was  wild. 

For  a  year  (1751)  Patrick  was  a  clerk  in  a  country 
store,  learning  the  business;  and,  when  he  was  sixteen, 
his  father  bought  a  stock  of  goods  and  "  set  him  up  in 
trade,"  with  William  as  his  equal  partner.  He  was  to 
weigh  sugar,  draw  molasses,  measure  off  calico.  Such 
is  the  world's  way  with  genius;  but  then,  how  is  the 
world  to  acquire  foreknowledge  of  divine  fire  in  a  lad 
till  the  first  spark  shows? 

y^At  this  period  there  were  many  Scotch  merchants 
east  of  the  Blue  Ridge.  They  were  individual  immi 
grants  ;  and  are  not  to  be  confused  with  the  Scotch- 
Irish — the  Presbyterian  backwoodsmen — who  helped  to 
people  the  Shenandoah  region,  bringing  with  them 
clear-cut  memories  of  Londonderry  and  standing  as  a 
barrier  against  the  incursions  of  the  savages. 

As  for  the  colonial  store,  it  was  a  prime  economic 
36 


STRUGGLES 

agency.  Its  importance  was  felt  not  only  in  Patrick 
Henry's  century  but  in  the  preceding  one.  Its  invento 
ries,  as  preserved  in  the  records  of  the  tidewater  coun 
ties,  show  what  good  customers  of  England  the  Virginia 
people  were ;  and  cause  one  to  wonder  that  the  rulers  of 
Great  Britain  should  have  alienated  a  trade  of  such 
volume  and  desirability  by  the  enforcement  of  laws  that 
incited  finally  to  revolution.  These  stores  were  mainly 
at  the  landings  and  cross-roads.  Many  of  them  became 
landmarks.  Their  history  would  be  the  history  of 
neighborhoods ;  for  in  front  of  the  counters  a  thousand 
scenes  were  enacted,  stories  told,  characters  revealed — 
all  reflecting  the  familiar  life  of  high  families  and  mean 
— white  people  and  black — throughout  the  Old  Domin 
ion.  /)n  Saturdays  especially  could  Laurence  Sterne 
have4ound  subjects  for  character-study  if  he  had  sailed 
up  the  York  and  tarried  awhile  in  Hanover.  He  would 
have  found  some  people  in  log-houses  and  some  in 
mansions;  but,  for  the  most  part,  he  would  have  been 
entertained  by  well-mannered  folk,  dwelling  in  frame 
structures,  with  an  outside  chimney  at  each  end.  The 
cooking  would  have  pleased  him — if  not  the  "  charac 
ters  "  at  the  cross-roads  village,  with  its  blacksmith's, 
wheelwright's,  and  shoemaker's  shops — biscuits  made  of 
complete  and  unadulterated  flour,  roast  duck,  goose, 
turkey,  lamb,  and  acorn-fed  pig,  which,  prior  to  the 
sticking,  had  been  as  fond  of  the  forest  as  our  Patrick 
himself. 

Patrick,  it  seems,  understood  that  a  country  store 
is  a  school  for  the  study  of  human  nature.  It  appears 
also  that  he  was  an  apt  pupil.  In  his  own  small  store, 
he  laid  the  basis  of  that  knowledge  of  men  which  never 
failed  him  when  it  came  his  turn  to  play  upon  their 
emotions.  Whether  weighing  sugar,  drawing  molasses,  or 
ripping  calico,  he  was  wide  awake  to  the  human  comedy. 
"  Whenever  a  company  of  his  customers  met  in  the 

37 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

store,"  says  Wirt,  "  and  were  themselves  sufficiently  gay 
and  animated  to  talk  and  act  as  nature  prompted,  with 
out  concealment,  without  reserve,  he  would  take  no  part 
in  their  discussions,  but  listen  with  a  silence  as  deep 
and  attentive  as  if  under  the  influence  of  some  potent 
charm.  If,  on  the  contrary,  they  were  dull  and  silent, 
he  would,  without  betraying  his  drift,  task  himself  to 
set  them  in  motion  and  excite  them  to  remarks,  collision, 
and  exclamation."  Nothing  suited  him  better  than  to 
start  a  debate  and  then  watch  the  debaters.  Their  logic 
or  lack  of  it,  their  sophistries,  their  processes  of  thought 
— these  things  Patrick  seized  upon  and  measured  just 
as  if  he  had  it  in  mind  to  write  an  American  book  on 
the  "  Human  Understanding,"  in  rivalry  with  Mr. 
Locke.  Concerning  this  characteristic,  Captain  George 
Dabney  testifies:  "He  [Patrick]  had  a  most  extraor 
dinary  talent  for  collecting  the  sentiments  of  his  com 
pany  upon  any  subject,  without  discovering  his  own ; 
and  he  would  effect  this  by  interrogations  which  to  the 
company  often  appeared  to  be  irrelevant  to  the  subject." 
All  of  which  suggests  that  our  Patrick  was  something 
of  a  lawyer  before  he  studied  law. 

Tales  about  his  storekeeping  are  told  in  Hanover 
to-day,  after  the  lapse  of  one  hundred  and  fifty  years. 
Are  they  true?  We  doubt  it.  They  sound  as  if  told 
of  other  storekeepers  and,  when  the  names  of  those 
cross-roads  characters  had  been  lost,  applied  to  Henry. 
The  salt-sack  tradition  is  a  case  in  point.  Patrick  was 
stretched  out  at  full  length  on  a  sack  filled  with  salt, 
and  was  in  the  thick  of  a  subtle  discussion,  when  a 
customer  entered,  saying:  "Have  you  any  salt,  sir?" 
"  Just  sold  the  last  peck,"  said  Patrick. 

Such  anecdotes  seem  out  of  character  when  one  goes 
over  the  store-book  kept  by  Patrick  in  his  own  hand. 
There  are  in  pages  of  entries.  The  writing  is  clear, 
firm,  and  neat.  There  are  no  blots,  but  an  occasional 

38 


STRUGGLES 

splutter  of  Patrick's  pen  is  still  recorded,  so  good  was 
the  ink  he  used.  He  wrote  "  sticks-hair  "  for  hairpins ; 
and  spelled  buckram  "buckrum,"  and  shoe-buckles 
"  shew-buckles."  He  seems  to  have  supplied  Hanover 
people  with  a  great  variety  of  articles ;  and  there  is 
evidence  in  his  careful  bookkeeping  that  he  tried  to  be 
a  good  merchant.  The  site  of  a  store  managed  by  him 
is  pointed  out  to  this  day  on  the  slope  of  a  hill  near 
Hanover  Court-house.  The  place  overlooks  the  valley 
of  Court-house  Creek  and  affords  a  pleasant  view. 

Patrick  may  have  been  superior  to  his  customers  in 
rural  dialectics,  but  some  of  them  were  shrewd  with  a 
different  sort  of  shrewdness.  While  he  was  taking 
advantage  of  them  in  one  way,  they  were  getting  the 
better  of  him  in  another.  He  was  too  good-natured. 
They  played  upon  the  young  merchant  as  easily  as  he 
played  upon  his  own  flute — they  ran  up  bills  which 
they  failed  to  meet,  and  within  a  year  the  firm  of 
Henry  and  Henry  went  out  of  business. 

As  between  the  brothers,  Patrick  had  the  better  head, 
so  it  fell  to  him  to  look  after  various  unsettled  affairs 
connected  with  their  mercantile  misadventures.  This 
took  many  months ;  and  if,  meantime,  Patrick  saw  fit 
to  hunt  a  great  deal,  there  was  only  fairness  in  it; 
since  he,  too,  was  being  hunted — by  the  boy  with  the 
bow  and  arrows.  He  fell  in  love  with  Sarah  Shelton, 
daughter  of  John  Shelton,  who  lived  on  a  farm  in  the 
part  of  Hanover  known  as  "  the  Forks."  It  is  a  pity 
that  Wirt,  who  had  opportunities  to  ascertain  all  needful 
data  concerning  the  great  orator's  early  life,  did  not 
strengthen  his  "  Sketches "  with  certain  essentials, 
reserving  his  rhetoric  and  romance  for  an  account  con 
spirito  of  Patrick's  courtship  of  the  maid  whose  father 
soon  became  the  tavern-keeper  at  Hanover  Court 
house.  We  may  be  sure  that  Scott  or  Burns  would 
have  brought  Patrick's  first  love  into  the  true  light, 

39 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

and  that  the  odor  of  the  magnolia  blooms  in  the 
branches  and  along  the  roadsides  near  "  the  Forks  " 
would  have  been  conveyed  to  the  reader.  Those  who 
know  what  love  is  to  a  lad  of  eighteen  may  readily 
imagine  how  it  seized  upon  Patrick,  and  lit  up  all 
Hanover  for  him.  A  stripling  thus  possessed  needs 
but  a  short  vaulting-pole  to  leap  a  wide  and  dangerous 
stream  if  his  sweetheart  be  upon  the  far  side.  But  to 
Wirt  the  affair  lacked  appeal.  If  Patrick  had  gone 
love-making  among  the  Pamunkeys — last  of  the  Poca- 
hontas  tribe — and  had  borne  off  their  feathered  belle, 
then  we  may  be  sure  that  the  Wirt  imagination  would 
have  been  challenged ;  and  we  should  have  had  the  story 
of  the  wooing,  magnolias  and  all.  But  he  took  little 
interest  in  Sarah  Shelton  * — we  do  not  know  if  she  had 
grace  in  her  heart  and  color  in  her  cheek  or  anything 
about  her  except  that  "  she  was  an  estimable  woman,  of 
most  excellent  parentage,  and  brought  him  [Patrick] 
six  negroes  and  a  tract  of  poor  land,  containing  three 
hundred  acres,  called  '  Pine  Slash/ '  The  word 
"  slash  "  brings  to  mind  the  fact  that  Henry  Clay,  the 
"  Mill  Boy  of  the  Slashes,"  was  born  in  Patrick  Henry's 
country.  But  this  was  some  years  later.  It  is  still  the 
fall  of  1754,  as  far  as  Patrick  is  concerned;  the  times 
are  hard  because  of  the  French  War ;  he  is  not  yet  nine 
teen,  and  he  has  just  begun  a  long  struggle. 

*  According  to  the  William  and  Mary  College  Quarterly 
Historical  Magazine,  vol.  vii,  p.  n,  William  Parks,  founder 
of  the  Virginia  Gazette — the  first  Virginia  editor — left  a  part 
of  his  estate  to  his  daughter  Eleanor  Shelton,  wife  of  John 
Shelton  of  Hanover.  It  would  seem  from  Parks'  will,  proved 
at  Yorktown,  June  18,  1750,  that  "the  first  wife  of  Patrick 
Henry,  Sarah  Shelton,  daughter  of  John  Shelton  of  Hanover, 
was  granddaughter  of  William  Parks  and  Eleanor  his  wife. 
It  is  probable  that  Mrs.  Henry  derived  her  name,  Sarah,  from 
Mrs.  Packe,  who  was  perhaps  connected  by  family  ties  with 
William  Parks  or  his  wife  Eleanor." 

40 


STRUGGLES 

Though  gifts  came  to  him  from  "  Mount  Brilliant/' 
and  though  John  Shelton,  who  lived  on  the  next  farm, 
helped  him,  Patrick  must  have  met  with  many  discour 
agements.  The  principal  crops  were  wheat,  corn,  oats, 
and  tobacco.  Corn  was  used  on  the  farm.  Oats  were 
harvested  when  in  the  milky  stage  and  fed  to  sheep. 
Tobacco  alone  was  salable.  Bear  in  mind  that  there 
were  no  markets  for  farm  products  in  the  Virginia  of 
Patrick  Henry's  youth.  Patrick  managed  his  slaves ; 
"  salted  "  the  ranging  stock  which  bore  his  brand — 
pigs,  sheep,  and  cattle ;  and  bent  his  own  back  to  labor. 
Farming  was  all  the  more  difficult  for  him  because  some 
of  his  dower  slaves  were  not  old  enough  to  work  but 
quite  old  enough  to  eat.  In  fact,  our  Patrick  becomes  a 
figure  to  look  upon.  Sunburnt,  sweaty,  hard-handed, 
the  man  to  whom  the  whole  continent  would  by  and  by 
be  listening  now  swings  the  hoe  as  he  grubs  new 
ground  that  a  few  more  tobacco  hills  may  be  made  for 
the  coming  harvest. 

As  before  intimated,  we  find  it  in  our  dispositions  to 
lionize  young  Abraham  Lincoln,  who  rested  on  his 
elbows  when  he  read  by  firelight,  and  to  condemn  young 
Patrick  Henry,  who  preferred  to  roll  over  on  his  back. 
Why  we  draw  so  positive  a  distinction  few  could 
explain;  but  certainly  all  who  in  imagination  delight 
to  see  the  sweat-drops  trickle  down  the  cheeks  of  ado 
lescent  genius  must  admit  that  our  Patrick  at  "  Pine 
Slash  "  was  little  better  off  than  our  Abraham  when  he 
swung  his  axe  and  split  his  rails. 

Yet  it  could  not  have  been  all  toil  and  no  joy  at 
'"  Pine  Slash."  There  was  the  young  wife,  who,  in 
course  of  time,  bore  him  six  children.  There  was  the 
pleasing  sense  of  proprietorship,  if  not  of  actual  pros 
perity.  There  was  sport,  also.  Nearly  every  farm  in 
Hanover  had  its  pack  of  hounds.  Game  abounded — 
foxes,  raccoons,  deer,  bears,  rabbits,  wild  turkeys,  quail, 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

and,  in  the  thick  of  the  forests,  wild-cats  and  panthers. 

Fate,  however,  did  not  intend  that  Patrick  Henry 
should  hide  his  talents  on  "  Pine  Slash  "  farm.  In  the 
shape  of  fire,  she  visited  him  and  burned  his  dwelling- 
house,  with  the  greater  part  of  his  furniture.  So,  in 
I757>  Patrick  Henry  ceased  to  be  a  farmer. 

This  year,  be  it  remembered,  he  was  twenty-one.  It 
is  the  exact  half-way  date  in  Virginia's  three  hundred 
years  of  history.  Various  happenings  at  this  time  gave 
rise  to  law-making,  to  controversy,  and  deep  division. 
Peace  preceded  it;  a  great  quarrel  followed  it.  We 
may  not  say  that  it  was  a  year  that  stood  at  the  turn 
between  new  and  old,  yet  it  is  a  memorable  date.  But 
the  question  is :  Did  Patrick  gain  or  lose  by  his  experi 
ence  at  "  Pine  Slash  "  ?  There  is  no  doubt  about  it.  He 
gained.  A  sagacious  man  who  uproots  tree-stumps  and 
digs  ditches  bethinks  him  as  he  toils  of  kings,  govern 
ments,  and  taxes.  Without  knowing  what  he  thinks, 
such  a  man  reaches  true  conclusions.  Much  of  the 
sound  common-sense  characteristic  of  Patrick  Henry 
was  in  all  likelihood  developed  under  stress  of  hard 
work  at  "  Pine  Slash."  Much  of  his  subsequent  popu 
larity  with  the  plain  people  of  Virginia  was  due  to  the 
fact  that  he  was  their  spokesman,  and  he  was  their 
voice  because  he  had  learned  to  enter  into  their  feelings. 
He  had  been  one  of  them,  and  continued  to  be  one  of 
them. 

With  his  house  in  ashes,  and  his  family  to  keep,  it 
was  necessary  to  sell  some  of  his  negroes;  and  this  he 
did — no  doubt  regretfully,  for,  as  we  shall  see,  his 
heart  was  troubled  on  the  score  of  slavery.  With  the 
money  thus  acquired,  he  had  the  hardihood  to  start 
another  store.  There  was  a  clerk  to  help  him;  for,  in 
the  planting  season,  part  of  his  time  was  spent  at  "  Pine 
Slash  "  farm.  Again,  however,  he  had  numerous  oppor 
tunities  to  study  humankind.  From  his  seat  on  the 

42 


STRUGGLES 

counter,  his  long  legs  dangling  down,  he  could  listen 
and  quiz,  and  enrich  his  expanding  mind  with  the  wis 
dom  of  the  countryside.  But  frequently  he  must  have 
been  a  lonesome  man.  For  the  times  were  still  hard 
in  1758,  and  next  year  the  tobacco  crop  failed,  so  that 
some  of  his  customers  were  unable  to  settle  with  him. 
The  total  of  his  cash  sales  to  July,  1760,  was  less  than 
£40.  Again  he  gave  up  storekeeping.  At  twenty-four, 
he  was  face  to  face  with  an  unpromising  world.  Not 
only  had  he  thrice  failed  in  his  attempts  to  earn  a  liveli 
hood — he  was  in  debt.  But  he  was  not  a  bankrupt,  as 
has  been  said  of  him;  nor  was  he  ever  sued.  Of  this 
latter  fact  he  was  proud  till  his  dying  day. 

As  in  General  Grant's  case  a  hundred  years  later, 
and  as  in  numberless  other  instances,  known  or  un 
known,  his  qualities  of  superiority  were  in  disuse — 
undiscovered  by  the  world,  unsuspected  by  himself. 
Was  he  downcast  at  this  crisis  in  his  affairs — was  he 
ready  to  give  up?  Not  at  all;  only  he  pondered  more. 
He  tried  to  measure  his  capacity.  He  was  rational; 
sanguine;  ready  to  trust  in  that  future  out  of  which  a 
ship  is  ever  due  when  men  are  young.  That  this  is 
true  of  him  appears  from  a  description  of  the  Christmas 
festivities  (1759)  at  the  house  of  his  good  friend  Cap 
tain  Nathaniel  West  Dandridge,  who  had  served  in  the 
British  Navy  but  who  now  lived  ashore,  being  fortunate 
both  in  his  means  and  his  mate — Dorothea  Spotswood 
Dandridge,  daughter  of  Governor  Alexander  Spotswood. 
The  witness  who  describes  these  festivities  is  Thomas 
Jefferson.  Writing  late  in  life,  his  memory  may  have 
been  at  fault.  Hostility,  too,  gave  his  words  a  bias. 
But,  with  all  said,  we  certainly  cannot  do  better  than 
glance  over  the  shoulder  of  one  who  now  saw  Henry 
for  the  first  time  and  who  was  to  become  in  turn  his 
admirer,  friend,  rival,  opponent,  critic,  and  detractor. 
It  is  Jefferson  who  turns  on  the  light: 

43 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

"  My  acquaintance  with  Mr.  Henry  commenced  in  the  winter 
of  1759-60.  On  my  way  to  the  college  [William  and  Mary] 
I  passed  the  Christmas  holidays  at  Dandridge's,  in  Hanover, 
to  whom  Mr.  Henry  was  a  near  neighbor.  During  the  festivity 
of  the  season  I  met  him  in  society  every  day,  and  we  became 
well  acquainted,  although  I  was  much  his  junior,  being  then 
in  my  seventeenth  year,  and  he  a  married  man.  His  manners 
had  something  of  coarseness  in  them ;  his  passion  was  music, 
dancing,  and  pleasantry.  He  excelled  in  the  last,  and  it  attached 
every  one  to  him.  You  ask  some  account  of  his  mind  and 
information  at  this  period,  but  you  will  recollect  that  we  were 
almost  continually  in  the  usual  revelries  of  the  season.  The 
occasion,  perhaps,  as  much  as  his  idle  disposition,  prevented 
his  engaging  in  any  conversation  which  might  give  the  measure 
either  of  his  mind  or  information.  Opportunity  was  not,  indeed, 
wholly  wanting,  because  Mr.  John  Campbell  was  there,  who 
had  married  Mrs.  Spotswood,  the  sister  of  Colonel  Dandridge. 
He  was  a  man  of  science  and  often  introduced  conversation  on 
scientific  subjects.  Mr.  Henry  had,  a  little  before,  broken  up 
his  store — or,  rather,  it  had  broken  him  up;  but  his  misfor 
tunes  were  not  traced,  either  in  his  countenance  or  conduct." 

If  by  Patrick's  "  coarseness  "  Jefferson  meant  simple 
rusticity,  it  was  almost  a  case  of  "  pot  calling  kettle 
black."  For  we  read :  "  Handsome  in  his  old  age,  in 
his  youth  Jefferson  was  no  beauty.  Then  he  was  tall, 
thin,  raw-boned;  had  red  hair,  a  freckled  face,  and 
pointed  features."  His  letters  tattle  about  "  Becca," 
"  Sukey,"  "  Judy,"  and  "  Belinda,"  and  refer  to  that 
"  dull  old  scoundrel,  Lord  Coke." 

Patrick  in  holiday  humor  probably  was  different  from 
Patrick  after  the  holidays.  Unsettled  store  affairs  still 
concerned  him ;  but  he  saw  that  he  must  speedily  set 
foot  in  a  new  path.  What  should  he  make  of  himself? 
What  if  he  should  study  law?  Would  his  mother-wit 
see  him  through  ?  His  cousin,  Judge  Edmund  Winston, 
wrote  of  him :  "  He  may  be  considered  at  this  time  a 
virtuous  young  man,  unconscious  of  the  powers  of  his 
own  mind,  and  in  very  narrow  circumstances,  making 
a  last  effort  to  supply  the  wants  of  his  family." 

44 


STRUGGLES 

Neither  his  father  nor  father-in-law  was  able  to  give 
him  substantial  aid.  "  Adversity  toughens  manhood," 
wrote  Patrick,  late  in  life.  "  Be  sure,  my  son,"  he  once 
said  to  his  young  kinsman,  Dr.  John  H.  Rice,  "  the  best 
men  always  make  themselves." 

"  All  other  experiments  having  failed,"  he  made  up 
his  mind  to  study  law.  Accordingly,  he  borrowed  a 
"  Coke  upon  Littleton  " — it  was  ten  years  before  Black- 
stone  appeared — and  set  to  work.  John  Lewis,  a  Han 
over  lawyer,  encouraged  him ;  his  own  father,  a  magis 
trate,  no  doubt  advised  him ;  and  Peter  Fontaine,  a  rela 
tive,  gave  him  a  volume  of  forms  of  declarations  and 
pleas.  That  he  knew  a  little  French  is  evident  because 
he  wrote  in  the  book :  "  Le  don  de  Pierre  de  la  Fon 
taine  .  .  .  Patrice  Henri  le  Jeune,  son  livre. 
Avrille  i8th,  1760." 

If  there  had  been  lack  of  zeal  on  Patrick's  part  when 
he  was  at  school,  it  was  not  so  now.  The  spur  of  neces 
sity  quickened  him.  He  seems  to  have  gone  through 
Coke  at  a  gallop,  grasping  all  he  needed.  How  long 
it  was  from  the  day  he  began  to  study  law  until  the 
day  he  presented  himself  before  the  Board  of  Exam 
iners  at  Williamsburg  is  a  mooted  point.  Some  say 
a  month ;  some,  six  weeks ;  others  assert  that  the  time 
was  not  so  absurdly  brief. 

Accounts  differ,  too,  as  to  his  reception  by  the  mem 
bers  of  the  Board.  In  a  memorandum  made  in  1814, 
Jefferson  gave  one  account ;  in  talking  at  Monticello 
with  Daniel  Webster  and  the  Ticknors,  in  1824,  he 
gave  another;  and  while  the  two  tally  in  the  main, 
there  is  a  discrepancy  as  to  the  examiners.  Jefferson 
says  that  Henry,  who  called  on  him  at  the  College, 
admitted  that  he  had  "  only  been  reading  law  six 
weeks."  Peyton  Randolph,  John  Randolph,  George 
Wythe,  and  Robert  C.  Nicholas  are  named  in  the  memo 
randum  as  the  men  to  whom  Patrick  applied  for  a 

45 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

license.  There  is  apt  to  be  confusion  about  the 
Randolphs  of  Virginia.  Anburey,  in  his  "  Travels/'  said 
of  them  in  1779:  "They  are  so  numerous  that 
they  are  obliged,  like  the  clans  of  Scotland,  to  be 
distinguished  by  their  places  of  residence."  Just  now 
we  are  meeting  the  two  sons  of  Sir  John  Randolph, 
and  later  we  shall  meet  his  grandson  Edmund,  as 
well  as  the  eccentric  John  Randolph  of  Roanoke. 
Of  the  two  importuned  by  Patrick  Henry,  Peyton, 
the  patriot  brother,  is  the  better  known.  He  was 
"  tall,  stately,  and  grave  in  manner ;  generous'  and 
hospitable ;  a  sound,  accurate,  and  able  lawyer."  John, 
the  Tory  brother,  became  the  King's  Attorney-General, 
quit  the  colony  at  the  outbreak  of  the  Revolution,  and 
died  an  unhappy  alien.  At  this  period,  he  was  in  full 
flower — learned,  courtly,  and  of  high  consequence. 
Imagine  the  Hanover  applicant,  country-clad  and  unpol 
ished,  stepping  into  the  presence  of  velvet,  ruffles,  and 
smooth-handed  elegance,  and  facing  a  pair  of  critical 
and  perhaps  contemptuous  eyes.  For  John  Randolph 
was  reluctant  to  begin  the  examination.  Not  until  he 
had  learned  that  two  members  of  the  Board  had  already 
signed  the  application  did  he  consent  to  quiz  him. 
Patrick  subsequently  described  the  ordeal  for  the  benefit 
of  his  friend  John  Tyler;  and  here  is  Judge  Tyler's 
report : 

"A  very  short  time  was  sufficient  to  satisfy  him  (Mr.  Ran 
dolph)  of  the  erroneous  conclusion  which  he  had  drawn  from 
the  exterior  of  the  candidate.  With  evident  marks  of  increas 
ing  surprise  (produced,  no  doubt,  by  the  peculiar  texture  and 
strength  of  Mr.  Henry's  style  and  the  boldness  and  originality 
of  his  combinations)  he  continued  the  examination  for  several 
hours;  interrogating  the  candidate,  not  on  the  principles  of 
municipal  law,  in  which  he  no  doubt  soon  discovered  his  defi 
ciency,  but  on  the  laws  of  nature  and  of  nations,  on  the  policy 
of  the  feudal  system,  and  on  general  history,  which  last  he  found 
to  be  his  stronghold.  During  the  very  short  portion  of  the  exam- 

46 


STRUGGLES 

ination  which  was  devoted  to  the  common  law,  Mr.  Randolph 
dissented,  or  affected  to  dissent,  from  one  of  Mr.  Henry's 
answers,  and  called  upon  him  to  assign  the  reasons  for  one 
of  his  opinions.  This  produced  an  argument;  and  Mr.  Ran 
dolph  now  played  off  on  him  the  same  arts  which  he  himself 
had  so  often  practised  on  his  customers,  drawing  him  out  by 
questions,  endeavoring  to  puzzle  him  by  subtleties,  assailing 
him  with  declamation,  and  watching  continually  the  defensive 
operations  of  his  mind.  After  a  considerable  discussion  he 
said :  '  You  defend  your  opinions  well,  sir,  but  now  to  the 
law  and  the  testimony.'  Hereupon  he  carried  him  to  his  office, 
and,  opening  the  authorities,  he  said  to  him :  |  Behold  the 
force  of  natural  reasons;  you  have  never  seen  thesVbot>ks,  nor 
this  principle  of  the  law;  yet  you  are  right  and  I  am  wrong; 
and  from  this  lesson  which  you  have  given  me  (you  must 
excuse  me  for  saying  it)  I  will  never  trust  to  appearances 
again.  [  Mr.  Henry,  if  your  industry  be  only  half  equal  to  your 
genius,  I  augur  that  you  will  do  well,  and  become  an  ornament 
and  an  honor  to  your  profession/  " 

John  Randolph,  as  well  as  Peyton,  told  Jefferson 
that,  though  Henry  was  ignorant  of  law,  he  had  genius 
in  him.  Jefferson  says  that  Robert  Carter  Nicholas 
withheld  his  signature  at  first,  but  gave  it  "  on  repeated 
importunities  and  promises  of  future  reading."  In  the 
Webster  talk,  Nicholas  is  not  mentioned ;  but  it  is  stated 
that  "  Pendleton  after  much  entreaty "  signed  the 
license.  George  Wythe,  who  was  professor  of  law  at 
William  and  Mary  College,  refused  to  sign.  He  was 
the  preceptor  of  Chief-Justice  Marshall  as  well  as  of 
Mr.  Jefferson.  "  Middle-sized,  with  dark  gray  eyes," 
this  learned  worthy,  famous  in  patriot  annals,  left  his 
mark  upon  the  fundamentals  of  the  Republic.  "  No 
one  ever  expressed  more  courtesy  in  a  bow,"  and  he 
bowed  young  Patrick  out.  Nevertheless,  Patrick  with 
his  license  must  have  ridden  with'  a  light  heart  when 
he  took  the  homeward  road.  As  he  had  little  to  do 
that  spring  and  summer,  and  as  his  practice  did  not 
begin  until  fall,  it  is  likely  that  he  kept  up  his  law 
studies. 

47 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

Yet  rumor  would  not  have  it  so.  Rumor  and  Mr. 
Jefferson  say  that  Patrick  Henry  came  to  two  bars  at 
once.  About  this  time  Shelton,  his  father-in-law,  began 
to  keep  the  tavern  at  Hanover  Court-house.  Tempo 
rarily  Patrick  and  his  family  made  it  their  home.  Jef 
ferson  calls  him  "  a  bar-keeper."  John  Bach  McMaster 
says  that  for  three  years  Henry  "  tended  travellers  and 
drew  corks."  Moses  Coit  Tyler  discredits  the  story. 
William  Wirt  Henry  scouts  it.  "  He  helped  his  father- 
in-law,  but  there  is  no  evidence  that  he  was  a  bar 
tender,"  says  the  excusatory  student,  ashamed  that  a 
man  who  rose  so  high  should  be  placed  so  low.  Con 
cerning  these  matters,  it  is  important  to  bear  in  mind 
that  Henry's  age  was  different  from  ours.  Self- 
righteous  as  we  are  with  regard  to  sanitation  and  other 
modernities  which  in  some  cases  sprang  from  the  labors 
of  the  very  men  we  abuse,  we  may  hold  our  imaginary 
noses  when  we  speak  patronizingly  of  the  stenches  of 
the  colonial  towns,  but  our  attitude  is  unfair.  Nor  is 
it  fair  to  class  the  Virginia  tavern,  which  had  its  proper 
place  in  the  scheme  of  existing  society,  with  some  cross 
roads  groggery  of  a  later  period  when  that  scheme  had 
changed.  Let  us  remember  that  towns  were  few  and 
far  between.  "  Where  now  only  the  meanest  brands  of 
whiskey  can  be  bought,"  says  Bruce,  "  madeira,  sherry, 
canary,  malaga,  muscadine,  fayal,  and  other  foreign 
wines  were  offered  for  sale,"  at  the  country  ordinaries. 
Though  this  refers  to  the  taverns  of  an  earlier  period, 
it  applies  as  well  to  those  of  Henry's  day.  Moreover, 
custom  then  sanctioned  what  now  would  be  thought  a 
stigma.  View  the  bar-keeping  story  as  we  may,  it  is 
allowable  to  conclude  that  Patrick  would  have  been  a 
scurvy  fellow  indeed  had  he  not  helped  John  Shelton. 

In  seeking  to  get  at  the  truth  as  to  Patrick,  one  lays 
himself  open  to  the  charge  of  becoming  his  apologist 
(as  if  he  needed  one!),  and,  what  is  worse,  of  impugn- 

48 


STRUGGLES 

ing  a  good  man,  William  Wirt,  and,  what  is  still  worse, 
of  taking  issue  with  a  great  man  who  should  be  very 
close  to  us,  considering  how  much  he  did — Thomas 
Jefferson.  Wirt  magnifies  Henry's  ignorance  of  the 
law.  Jefferson  says  that  he  was  "  too  lazy  to  practise," 
adding :  "  Whenever  the  courts  were  closed  for  the 
winter  session,  he  would  make  up  a  party  of  poor  hunt 
ers  of  his  neighborhood,  would  go  off  with  them  to  the 
piney  woods  of  Fluvanna  and  pass  weeks  in  hunting 
deer,  of  which  he  was  passionately  fond,  sleeping  under 
a  tent  before  a  fire,  wearing  the  same  shirt  the  whole 
time,  and  covering  all  the  dirt  of  his  dress  with  a  hunt 
ing  shirt.  He  never  undertook  to  draw  pleadings  if  he 
could  avoid  it,  or  to  manage  that  part  of  a  cause,  and 
very  unwillingly  engaged  but  as  an  assistant  to  speak 
in  the  cause.  And  the  fee  was  an  indispensable  pre 
liminary,  observing  to  the  applicant  that  he  kept  no 
accounts,  never  putting  pen  to  paper,  which  was  true." 
.  Patrick  Henry's  fee-books,  now  to  be  seen  at  Red 
Hill,  were  kept  with  his  own  hand.  They  show  that 
Jefferson  was  wrong.  The  first  fee-book  contains  the 
names  of  sixty  clients,  all  entered  during  the  fall  of 
1760.  One  page  is  missing,  but  the  other  pages  make 
record  of  175  fees.  By  the  end  of  1763,  Henry  had 
charged  fees  in  1,185  suits.  "An  examination  of  these 
entries  of  fees,"  says  his  grandson,  "  shows  that  Mr. 
Henry  was  transacting  all  the  business  of  a  country 
practice,  his  courts  being  the  county  courts  of  Hanover 
and  the  surrounding  counties.  The  county  courts,  held 
by  justices,  were  the  only  courts  in  the  colony,  except 
the  General  Court,  consisting  of  the  Governor  and  his 
Council,  at  Williamsburg.  The  country  practice,  which 
embraced  every  branch  of  the  profession,  was  the  best 
training  which  he  could  have  had.  It  was  impossible 
for  him  to  have  acquired  or  retained  it,  unless  he  had 
been  attentive  in  his  business,  and  industrious  in  his 
4  49 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

habits,  for  the  great  bulk  of  it  was  mere  routine  work, 
such  as  bringing  plain  actions  of  debt."  It  may  be 
added  that  Randall,  in  his  "  Life  of  Jefferson,"  says 
that  for  the  first  four  years  Jefferson  had  but  504  cases. 
So,  thanks  to  the  good  nutgall  in  the  ink  used  by 
Patrick  himself,  we  have  in  his  fee-books  evidence  that 
his  early  work  at  the  bar  was  too  exacting  to  permit 
him  to  be  of  much  use  at  Hanover  tavern.  But  it  is 
easy  to  believe  that  he  did  find  time  to  go  to  Fluvanna 
after  deer ;  and  it  is  agreeable  to  think  of  him  as  coming 
home  laden  with  venison  for  John  Shelton's  larder. 
He  was  still  obscure,  but  his  struggle  for  bread  had 
ceased.  He  was  on  the  right  road  at  last. 


IV 

OUT    OF    OBSCURITY A    SUDDEN    LEAP 

"  Whose  life  in  low  estate  began 

And  on  a  simple  village  green ; 

Who  breaks  his  birth's  invidious  bar, 

And  grasps  the  skirts  of  happy  chance, 
And  breasts  the  blows  of  circumstance, 

And  grapples  with  his  evil  star; 

Who  makes  perforce  his  merit  known." 

— TENNYSON  :  "  In  Memoriam." 

"  SHAKESPEARE  was  born  so."  No  doubt  of  that. 
Nevertheless,  he  profited  by  his  playhouse  environment. 
Even  if  our  lesser  Virginia  genius  inherited  his  ora 
torical  aptitude,  he  must  have  been  influenced  by  speak 
ers  heard  by  him  in  his  youth.  Who  were  they?  In 
answering  the  question,  we  find  ourselves  reentering 
Hanover  by  a  new  and  interesting  approach.  It  is  con 
venient,  nay,  necessary,  to  ride  in  on  the  crupper  of  the 
Rev.  William  Robinson's  horse. 

Robinson  was  a  "  New  Light  "  revivalist,  and  when, 
in  his  travels,  he  reached  Hanover  County,  nightfall 
found  him  many  miles  short  of  his  appointed  preaching 
place  next  day.  So  he  put  up  at  an  inn,  whose  keeper, 
as  it  happened,  swore  abominably.  Robinson  rebuked 
the  tavern-keeper,  who  bristled  at  once,  saying: 

"  Pray,  sir,  who  are  you,  to  take  such  authority  on 
yourself?" 

"  I  am  a  minister  of  the  gospel." 

'''  Then  you  belie  your  looks." 

Imagine  the  stir  among  the  loungers,  and  the  laugh 
they  raised ;  for  small-pox  had  robbed  our  itinerant  of 
an  eye,  and  a  rough  world  had  put  upon  him  the  stamp 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

of  a  Carolina  drover.     He  explained  that  he  was  to 
preach  next  day. 

"  If  you  will  accompany  me,"  said  he,  "  you  may  be 
convinced." 

"  I  will  if  you'll  preach  from  a  text  I'll  give  you." 

"Agreed.    What  is  it?" 
'  For  I  am  fearfully  and  wonderfully  made.'  ' 

Again  can  we  hear  the  shout.  But  traditions  of  that 
sermon,  preached  before  thousands — out  in  the  open 
under  the  trees — linger  in  the  Patrick  Henry  neighbor 
hood  to-day.  It  was  the  beginning  of  a  movement  that 
made  Hanover  famous  as  "  the  cradle  of  Presbyterian- 
ism  "  for  a  vast  region  west  and  south  of  the  Chesa 
peake.  '*  There  have  lived  men  in  Virginia,"  says 
Foote,  writing  of  the  struggle  for  religious  liberty, 
"  whose  names  are  worthy  of  everlasting  remembrance. 
There  have  been  events  that  should  never  be  forgotten. 
There  have  been  principles  avowed  whose  influence  will 
be  felt  through  all  time."  To  disregard  the  "  New 
Light  "  movement,  begun  by  Makemie  on  the  Eastern 
Shore,  and  transferred  by  Robinson  to  Hanover,  would 
be  to  ignore  one  of  the  most  powerful  formative 
influences  upon  Henry  both  as  a  thinker  and  as  an 
orator. 

And  since  Robinson  has  come  into  these  pages  by 
way  of  one  anecdote,  let  Makemie  come  in  by  way  of 
another,  or  rather  as  an  actor  in  a  spirited  scene — less 
dramatic  than  that  powerful  scene  of  the  first  of  Sep 
tember,  1670,  when  William  Penn  outfaced  a  bench 
of  ten  justices  at  the  Old  Bailey,  but  strong  and  moving 
nevertheless. 

Let  us  join  the  spectators  in  Lord  Cornbury's  Council 
Chamber,  in  New  York,  on  a  winter  afternoon  between 
three  and  four  o'clock.  Enter,  from  the  prison  at  Fort 
Anne,  the  Rev.  Francis  Makemie,  of  Accomac,  in  Vir 
ginia,  and  the  Rev.  John  Hampton,  of  Maryland. 

52 


OUT  OF  OBSCURITY 

"  Lord  Cornbury :  '  How  dare  you  to  take  it  upon  you  to 
preach  in  my  government  without  license?  ' 

"  Makemie :  '  We  have  liberty  from  an  Act  of  Parliament 
made  in  the  first  year  of  the  reign  of  King  William  and  Queen 
Mary,  which  gave  us  liberty,  with  which  law  we  have  complied.' 

"  Cornbury :  '  None  shall  preach  in  my  government  without 
my  license.  .  .  .  New  York  is  of  her  Majesty's  dominions; 
but  the  Act  of  Toleration  does  not  extend  to  the  plantations 
by  its  own  intrinsic  virtue  or  any  intention  of  the  legislat 
ors.  .  .  .  That  Act  of  Parliament  was  made  against  stroll 
ing  preachers,  and  you  are  such  and  shall  not  preach  in  my 
government.' 

"  Makemie :  '  The  Quakers  .  .  .  they  travel  and  teach 
over  the  plantations,  and  are  not  molested.' 

"  Cornbury :  '  I  have  troubled  some  of  them,  and  will  trouble 
them  more.  .  .  .  You  shall  not  spread  your  pernicious 
doctrines  here.' 

"  Makemie :  *  As  to  our  doctrines,  my  lord,  we  have  our 
Confession  of  Faith.  ...  I  challenge  all  the  clergy  of 
York  ... 

"  Cornbury :  '  You  must  give  bond  and  security  for  your  good 
behavior,  and  also  bond  and  security  to  preach  no  more  in  my 
government.' 

"  Makemie :    '  We  neither  can  nor  dare.' 

"Cornbury:  'Then  you  must  go  to  jail.'" 

But  Makemie,  the  founder  of  Presbyterianism  in 
America,  labored  near  the  seashore.  He  was  unknown 
in  the  great  Anglican  region  west  of  the  bay.  For  more 
than  a  century  the  Established  Church  had  been  supreme 
there.  It  was,  in  reality,  an  outlying  part  of  England. 
<;  Society,"  says  A.  G.  Bradley,  "  was  tenaciously  Eng 
lish,  based  upon  landed  property  and  to  some  extent  the 
negroes.  Imagine  an  English  county  in  the  last  century, 
with  the  higher  aristocracy  removed  and  the  squires  of 
small  or  moderate  fortune  left,  and  you  have  something 
like  a  county  of  Tidewater  Virginia  in  1736."  It  was  a 
squirarchy.  "  Primogeniture  and  entail  were  in  vogue, 
and  a  herald  at  Williamsburg  sat  in  judgment  on  shields 
and  quarterings."  As  for  the  clergy,  their  hold  seemed 
as  strong  upon  the  colony  as  upon  England — stronger, 

53 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

indeed,  for  the  Scotch-Irish  dissenters  had  not  as  yet 
begun  to  people  the  valley  of  the  Shenandoah. 

Readers  of  that  Virginia  classic,  William  Meade's 
"  Old  Churches,  Ministers,  and  Families/'  need  not  be 
reminded  that  many  clergymen  of  the  Established 
Church  were  men  of  dignity  and  character.  To  use 
Edmund  Randolph's  words,  "  they  were  planted  on 
glebes,  with  comfortable  houses,  decent  salaries,  some 
perquisites,  and  a  species  of  rank  which  was  not  wholly 
destitute  of  unction."  Whether  they  were  willing  or 
not,  the  taxpayers  annually  paid  each  clergyman  16,000 
pounds  of  tobacco;  for  marrying  the  fee  was  400 
pounds ;  for  burying,  200.  There  were  "  sweet-scented 
parishes  "  and  "  Orinoco  parishes,"  according  to  the 
variety  of  tobacco  grown.  Down  near  the  North  Caro 
lina  line  the  clergy  were  paid  in  tar. 

Perhaps  the  light-hearted  life  led  by  the  "  Tuckahoe  " 
gentry  caused  some  of  the  ministers  to  lose  themselves 
in  worldliness.  The  Virginians  lived  in  plenty,  and 
dressed  in  style.  They  did  not  loiter  when  in  the  sad 
dle,  but  moved  at  a  sharp  hand-gallop,  their  horses 
taking  the  roads  unshod.  They  used  much  physic  to 
ward  off  fever-and-ague,  and  drank  much  with  the 
same  object.  General  Washington,  be  it  recalled,  rec 
ommended  as  "  a  cure  for  chills  "  two  glasses  of  Ma 
deira,  followed  the  next  morning  by  a  glass  of  claret. 
But  the  Virginians  also  drank  with  no  object  at  all. 
When  they  died,  there  was  no  famine  at  their  funerals ; 
it  was  a  feast  rather,  and  a  flow;  and  there  was  more 
real  drunkenness  than  real  sorrow.  The  Rev.  Andrew 
Burnaby,  Vicar  of  Greenwich,  travelling  among  them  in 
1760,  found  them  "  indolent,  easy,  good-natured, 
extremely  fond  of  society,  and  much  given  to  convivial 
pleasures.  They  are  haughty  and  jealous  of  their  liber 
ties,"  he  added,  "  impatient  of  restraint,  and  scarcely 
bear  the  thought  of  being  controlled  by  a  superior 

54 


OUT  OF  OBSCURITY 

power."  "  Generally  speaking,"  says  another  traveller, 
"  the  young  men  are  gamblers,  cock-fighters,  and  horse 
jockies.  To  hear  them  converse,  you  would  imagine 
that  the  grand  point  of  all  science  was  properly  to  fix 
a  gaff  and  touch  with  dexterity  the  tail  of  a  cock  while 
in  combat.  At  almost  every  tavern  on  the  public  roads 
there  is  a  billiard  table,  a  backgammon  table,  cards, 
and  other  implements  of  various  games."  "  Tom 
Jones  "  evidently  would  not  have  been  lost  among  the 
Virginians  of  his  time.  Yet  we  are  concerned  in  these 
pages  less  about  "  Tom "  than  about  "  the  Rev.  Mr. 
Square "  and  "  the  Rev.  Mr.  Thwackem."  Beyond 
doubt,  there  were  flesh-and-blood  "  Thwackems  "  and 
"  Squares  "  in  the  tidewater  country ;  and  there  were 
numerous  other  clergymen  utterly  lacking  in  spirit 
uality.  Some  of  them  had  been  sent  over  the  water 
merely  that  the  British  Isles  might  be  rid  of  them. 
When  Commissary  Blair,  the  founder  of  William  and 
Mary  College,  who  was  in  the  old  country  seeking 
funds,  reminded  Sir  Edmund  Seymour  that  there  were 
souls  to  save  in  Virginia  as  well  as  in  England,  Sey 
mour  replied :  "  Souls !  Damn  your  souls  !  Grow 
tobacco !  "  Some  of  the  colonial  clergy  were  to  be  seen 
at  the  races;  at  the  cock-pit;  at  cards.  They  drank  to 
drunkenness.  One  was  customarily  strapped  in  his  gig 
when  homeward  bound  from  a  feast.  Another,  with  an 
undivorced  wife  in  England,  married  a  Virginia  widow. 
Another  fought  a  duel  within  sight  of  his  former 
church.  Another  denounced  the  brilliant  "  New 
Light  "  Waddell  as  a  "  pick-pocket,  dark-lantern,  moon 
light  preacher  and  enthusiast."  But  not  all  were 
unworthy.  A  story  is  told  of  an  old  lady  who,  having 
returned  from  church,  called  out  to  her  maid  to  take  off 
her  clothes — stiff  brocades — "  for  she  had  heard  so 
much  of  hell,  damnation,  and  death  that  it  would  take 
her  all  the  evening  to  get  cool." 

55 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

These  instances  of  clerical  worldliness  are  here  inter 
woven  with  the  Patrick  Henry  tale  because  they  serve 
to  put  us  in  touch  with  the  times,  and  because  they 
explain  how  a  tiny  moral  seed  dropped  in  Hanover, 
as  by  a  passing  bird,  grew  into  a  thriving  plant.  When 
Patrick  was  a  boy,  a  farmer  of  the  neighborhood 
picked  up  a  stray  leaf  lost  by  a  Scotch  immigrant  from 
a  book  of  sermons  and  read  it  with  astonishment.  He 
sent  to  London  for  the  book  itself — Boston's  "  Four 
fold  State."  Some  of  his  friends  read  it;  and  there 
was  a  sensation  in  those  parts.  Samuel  Morris  built  a 
:(  reading  house,"  and  soon  other  "  reading  houses  " 
were  constructed.  The  leaders  repeatedly  paid  fines  for 
non-attendance  at  the  parish  churches.  Summoned  to 
Williamsburg  and  examined  by  the  Governor,  the  dis 
senters  still  held  out.  They  had  no  complaint  against 
the  Anglican  doctrine,  or  its  beautiful  ceremonials ;  but 
the  parsons,  they  said,  had  ceased  to  fulfil  their  true 
ministerial  function.  For  a  long  time  they  did  not 
know  that  they  had  become  converts  to  the  Geneva 
school,  and  were  astonished  at  last  to  find  themselves 
Presbyterians.  Their  chief  thought  had  been :  "  Our 
old  churches  have  lost  something,  and  here  now  we  have 
found  that  something."  It  was  spirituality.  It  made 
all  the  difference.  So  that  was  why  they  had  sent  for 
the  fervid  Robinson,  who  began  by  converting  the  god 
less  tavern-keeper ;  and  that  was  why  they  begged  Rob 
inson  to  make  known  in  the  North  their  lack  of  a  min 
ister.  Because  he  would  not  accept  pay  for  his  preach 
ing,  they  secretly  filled  his  saddlebags  with  money. 

And  now  a  romance  of  religion ;  for  Robinson  spent 
the  money  in  educating  Samuel  Davies,  and  when  young 
Davies  was  ready  to  preach,  he  faithfully  rode  down 
into  Hanover.  Robinson  was  uncouth — not  so  his  hand 
some  protege,  a  man  of  presence.  It  was  he  who  faced 
the  learned  but  biased  lawyers  at  Williamsburg  in 

56 


THE    REV.    SAMUEL    DAVIES 

(Known  as  "The  Apostle  of  Virginia,"  and  lateral  the  head  of  Princeton 
College.  Patrick  Henry  found  in  Davies  a  model  in  effective  oratory ;  but  the 
pupil  outdid  the  master.  ) 


OUT  OF  OBSCURITY 

advocacy  of  his  right  to  preach,  reviving  the  half- 
forgotten  Toleration  Act,  and  opening  a  way  for  relig 
ious  liberty.  He  was  called  "  the  Apostle  of  Virginia." 
He  went  to  England  to  raise  money  for  Princeton  Col 
lege,  of  which  he  subsequently  became  president. 
George  II.  heard  him  preach,  and  so  pleased  was  his 
Majesty  that  he  interrupted  the  services  to  express  his 
approval ;  whereupon  Davies,  a  master  of  solemnity, 
said :  "  When  the  lion  roareth,  the  beasts  of  the  forest 
tremble;  when  the  Lord  speaketh,  let  the  kings  of  the 
earth  keep  silence." 

"  He  is  an  honest  man !  an  honest  man !  "  said  the 
King  to  his  courtiers  next  day,  when  he  sent  for  Davies 
and  gave  him  fifty  guineas  towards  the  college  fund. 

Davies  rebuked  cant  as  well  as  kings.  "  It  is  a  dread 
ful  thing,"  said  he,  "  to  talk  nonsense  in  the  name  of  the 
Lord." 

Such  was  the  scholarly  Samuel  Davies,  who,  possess 
ing  all  the  graces  of  gesture  and  an  almost  Miltonian 
command  of  language,  stood  before  young  Patrick 
Henry  as  a  model  in  oratory.  Patrick's  grandfather, 
Isaac  Winston,  was  one  of  the  Hanover  dissenters ;  so 
was  Patrick's  mother ;  so  were  two  of  his  sisters.  They 
went  to  "  the  Fork  Church "  to  hear  Davies  preach. 
Writing  of  Mrs.  Henry,  her  great-grandson  says : 
"  She  was  in  the  habit  of  riding  in  a  double  gig,  taking 
with  her  young  Patrick,  who,  from  the  first,  showed  a 
high  appreciation  of  the  preacher.  Returning  from 
church,  she  would  make  him  give  the  text  and  a  reca 
pitulation  of  the  discourse.  She  could  have  done  her 
son  no  greater  service." 

Dr.  Green,  of  Princeton,  says  that  Patrick  Henry 
"  spoke  in  terms  of  enthusiasm  of  Mr.  Davies.  It  is 
supposed  that  he  first  kindled  the  fire  and  afforded  the 
model  of  Henry's  elocution."  The  eloquence  of  Davies, 
testifies  Howe,  "  made  a  deep  impression  on  his 

57 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

[Henry's]  youthful  mind;  and  he  always  remarked  that 
Davies  was  the  greatest  orator  he  had  ever  heard." 

Moreover,  Patrick  had  a  patriotic  as  well  as  ora 
torical  model  in  Davies,  who,  between  1755  and  1759, 
preached  many  sermons  on  the  French  and  Indian  War. 
It  was  he  who  first  eulogized  "  that  heroic  youth,  Colonel 
Washington,  whom  I  cannot  but  hope  Providence  has 
hitherto  preserved  in  so  signal  a  manner  for  some 
important  service  to  his  country."  Patrick  was  eleven 
years  old  when  Davies  entered  Hanover;  twenty-two 
when  he  left.  And  since  "  Study  Men  "  was  Patrick's 
motto,  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  he  studied  the  great 
pulpit  orator. 

Having  thus  given  some  idea  of  the  "  New  Lights," 
and  having  set  forth  the  shortcomings  of  the  established 
clergy,  we  may  move  forward  with  the  young  lawyer 
to  the  fall  of  1763,  when  there  culminated  a  long  quarrel 
of  great  importance  to  him  individually  and  to  the  pub 
lic  as  well.  At  its  inception  there  was  fierce  pam 
phleteering  over  the  "  Parsons'  Cause,"  and  to  this 
day  men  dispute  about  the  rights  and  wrongs  involved 
in  it.  Without  further  ado,  we  may  muster  the  salient 
facts  and  march  them  out  for  inspection: 

Let  it  be  borne  in  mind  that  the  colonial  church  was 
planted  on  the  same  day  the  colony  itself 'was  planted. 
Part  and  parcel  of  the  scheme  of  government  in  Vir 
ginia,  and  performing  certain  useful  civil  functions, 
such  as  the  care  of  the  poor,  it  drew  its  revenues  by 
taxation.  Nearly  every  one  over  sixteen  years  of  age 
was  subject  to  this  tax.  Vestrymen,  who  held  the 
parish  purse,  filled  vacancies  in  their  own  membership, 
so  that  they  too  often  grew  to  be  close  corporations  in 
the  hands  of  a  few  families.  Accordingly,  by  age,  by 
custom,  and  by  generous  if  not  reverent  complaisance  on 
the  part  of  the  people,  the  church  was  deeply  rooted. 
In  modern  speech,  it  was  a  monopolistic  body.  Minis- 

58 


OUT  OF  OBSCURITY 

ters  were  ordained  in  England  and  to  England  they 
looked  for  episcopal  control,  though  the  Bishop  of  Lon 
don  had  a  representative  at  Williamsburg  known  as  a 
Commissary.  Dean  Swift  wished  to  be  sent  out  as 
Bishop  over  the  Virginia  Lilliputians,  but  there  was 
never  a  colonial  Bishop  in  the  Old  Dominion.  An  estab 
lished  church  without  a  real  head ;  a  government  with 
out  a  real  head — there  was  constant  temptation  to  look 
beyond  Williamsburg  to  London ;  and  London  was  alto- 
gether  too  busy  with  its  own  troubles  to  do  well  by  the 
colonists. 

Let  it  also  be  borne  in  mind  that  Virginia  had  no 
power  to  coin  money.  There  was  Spanish,  as  well  as 
British,  specie  in  the  colony ;  but  it  was  scarce.  Tobacco 
was  money.  "  Paid  ten  pounds  of  tobacco  for  '  duck- 
inge  '  a  scold  "  is  a  Seventeenth  Century  item  that  illus 
trates  the  point.  At  various  places  there  were  public 
warehouses,  where  inspectors  gave  receipts  for  tobacco ; 
and  these  certificates  of  deposit  circulated  as  money. 
By  a  law  of  1696,  the  annual  salary  of  every  clergyman 
was  raised  from  13,333  pounds  of  tobacco  to  16,000,  to 
be  levied  by  the  several  vestries  on  their  parishes.  In 
1748,  by  which  time  the  value  of  the  staple  had 
increased  fifty  per  cent.,  a  glebe  suit,  won  by  a  rector, 
led  to  the  enactment  of  a  more  particular  law,  approved 
by  the  King,  in  which  it  was  specified  that  the  levies 
for  the  clergy  were  to  be  "  laid  in  nett  tobacco  " — 16,000 
pounds  for  each. 

Soon  the  French  War  began.  Times  grew  hard. 
"  Our  people  are  loaded  with  debt,"  wrote  a  man  whom 
we  shall  meet  in  Hanover  Court-house,  by  and  by — the 
Rev.  James  Maury,  of  Fredericksville  parish,  Louisa 
County.  His  letter  is  dated  August  9,  1755.  "  Money 
is  much  scarcer  than  it  has  been  for  years.  Our  spring 
crops  of  wheat,  barley,  oats,  and  rye  have  been  ruined 
by  an  early  drought.  Our  Indian  corn  .  .  .  has 

59 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

been  hurt  by  a  later  drought.  .  .  .  Our  frontiers 
are  daily  ravaged  by  savages." 

Yet,  in  the  face  of  these  facts,  the  clergy  asked  for 
an  increase  in  salary.  It  is  allowable  to  think  that 
Patrick  Henry,  Junior,  as  a  tobacco  planter  and  tax 
payer,  viewed  the  salary-raising  suggestion  with  less 
favor  than  did  Patrick  Henry,  Senior,  who  would  have 
benefited  by  its  adoption.  Instead  of  raising  salaries, 
the  Burgesses  passed  an  option  law  for  the  relief  of  the 
people.  They  enacted  (1755)  that  for  ten  months  all 
tobacco  debts  should  be  discharged  in  money  at  the  rate 
of  twopence  per  pound.  Hence  the  law  was  called  the 
Twopenny  Act.  It  was  impracticable  to  send  it  to 
England  for  the  King's  sanction,  though  it  suspended 
the  law  of  1748  which  the  King  had  ratified. 

Again,  in  1758,  there  was  a  short  crop.  The  price 
advanced.  The  Burgesses  reenacted  the  Twopenny 
Law,  which  was  to  remain  in  force,  not  ten  months  only, 
but  a  year.  This  time  a  bitter  controversy  arose. 
Other  salaried  persons  were  affected  by  the  law,  but 
it  was  the  clergy  who  fought  it.  First  they  held  a  con 
vention.  Then  their  chief  pamphleteer,  the  Rev.  John 
Camm,  who  wrote  "  The  Colonels  Dismounted "  in 
reply  to  papers  by  Colonel  Richard  Bland  and  Colonel 
Landon  Carter,  was  sent  to  England  to  lay  their  griev 
ance  before  King  George.  This  same  Camm,  let  us 
note,  is  the  hero  of  one  of  the  most  popular  love  stories 
of  his  day.  In  the  interest  of  a  friend,  who  was  in  love 
with  Miss  Betsey  Hansford,  Professor  Camm  went  to 
see  the  young  lady,  praised  her  worshipper,  and  quoted 
the  Scriptures  to  convince  her  that  she  should  marry. 
Like  Priscilla,  whom  Miles  Standish  wished  but  John 
Alden  won,  Miss  Betsey  shook  her  head  as  she  eyed 
the  learned  and  handsome  bachelor.  At  last  she  told 
him  that  if  he  would  go  home  and  open  his  Bible  he 
might  find  her  answer  in  II  Samuel,  xii,  7.  It  was: 

60 


OUT  OF  OBSCURITY 

"  Thou  art  the  man ;  "  and  Miss  Hansford  became  Mrs. 
Camm.  He  was  successful  with  the  King,  too.  The 
King  pronounced  the  Twopenny  Law  no  law  at  all. 
And  when  news  of  this  ruling  reached  Virginia,  various 
clergymen  began  suits  in  the  county  courts  to  collect 
the  difference  between  £133  6s.  8d.  in  depreciated 
paper  money,  the  salary  as  paid,  and  tobacco  worth 
£  400,  the  salary  due. 

Were  the  ministers  right  or  wrong?  The  critics  of 
the  Twopenny  Act  of  1758  insist  that,  as  the  laborer 
is  worthy  of  his  hire,  so  was  the  parson  of  his  pay.  In 
early  colonial  days,  "  when  the  price  of  tobacco  was 
down,"  as  Moses  Coit  Tyler  expresses  it,  "  the  parson 
was  expected  to  suffer  the  loss ;  when  the  price  of 
tobacco  was  up,  he  was  allowed  to  enjoy  the  gain." 
The  fat  years  made  up  for  the  lean.  "  It  was  a  rough 
but  obvious  system  of  fair  play,"  thinks  Tyler,  who 
declares  that  the  side  upon  which  Patrick  Henry  found 
himself  was  "  wrong  both  in  law  and  in  equity."  Dr. 
Tyler,  a  staunch  churchman,  drew  his  conclusions  from 
facts  supplied  by  other  churchmen,  such  as  the  Rev. 
James  Maury,  plaintiff  in  the  test  case  (whose  letters 
on  the  "  Parsons'  Cause  "  are  published  in  Miss  Anne 
Maury 's  "  Memoirs  of  a  Huguenot  Family  "),  and  Wil 
liam  Stevens  Perry  in  "  Historical  Collections  relating 
to  the  American  Colonial  Church  "  ;  and  perhaps  there 
is  too  much  Episcopal  fervor  in  what  he  says.  To 
mulct  the  clergy  when  a  fat  year  came  was  "  a  mutila 
tion  of  justice."  By  the  law  of  1748  was  there  not  a 
valid  contract  between  every  vestry  and  its  minister? 
In  nullifying  this  law  there  was  breach  of  contract  and 
there  was  breach  of  faith  with  the  King.  Indeed,  the 
evil  spirit  of  repudiation  lurked  in  the  whole  scurvy 
business.  "  Such,  then,  in  all  its  fresh  and  unadorned 
rascality,"  concludes  Dr.  Tyler,  "  was  the  famous 
'option  law'  or  Twopenny  Act  of  1758." 

61 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

Bishop  Meade,  always  benignant,  is  less  severe  upon 
those  who  sought  to  commute  the  salaries  of  the  par 
sons.  Yet  that  the  parsons  were  wronged  he  has  no 
doubt.  Some  of  them  were  unable  to  marry  respect 
ably  on  such  small  pay.  Another  great  grievance  was 
that  they  were  obliged  to  spend  their  allowance  long 
before  it  was  received.  Hence  they  bought  at  disad 
vantage,  were  often  in  debt,  and  suffered  the  humilia 
tion  of  seeing  inferior  men  come  among  them  as  fel 
low-ministers.  But  the  good  Bishop  admits  that  a 
countenance  brighter  than  the  sun  had  been  withdrawn 
from  them  because  in  many  ways  they  were  a  corrupt 
clergy.  Similarly,  others  look  upon  the  proceedings  of 
the  Burgesses  as  a  subterfuge  in  denial  of  a  right  sanc 
tioned  by  long  usage.  They  speak  of  Lieutenant- 
Governor  Fauquier's  refusal  to  veto  the  act  as  "  cow 
ardly,"  and  of  Patrick  Henry's  onslaught  as  "  dema 
gogic."  A  juggle  is  a  juggle,  they  say;  and  the  appeal 
to  the  people  was  made  in  full  knowledge  of  their  selfish 
bias.  Thus  these  critics  put  all  the  wrongs  on  one  side 
and  all  the  rights  on  the  other. 

The  truth  is,  there  were  rights  and  wrongs  on  both 
sides.  The  colony  was  growing.  "  Like  the  straw 
berry,"  says  Charles  Campbell,  "  the  population  con 
tinually  sent  '  runners  '  to  possess  the  land."  In  Frede 
rick  and  Augusta  counties  little  tobacco  grew ;  and  it 
was  the  wish  of  the  vestries  there  to  pay  ministers  in 
money.  The  Burgesses  petitioned  the  King  for  leave  to 
act  on  their  own  initiative  in  certain  circumstances,  but 
his  Majesty  was  stiff-necked.  Every  year  new  prob 
lems  requiring  speedy  solution  arose.  High  tide  dam 
aged  great  quantities  of  tobacco  stored  in  the  riverside 
magazines,  and  the  Legislature  had  to  recompense  the 
owners  of  the  tobacco.  Should  they  forever  await  the 
King's  sanction  in  colonial  matters  of  purely  local  or 
emergent  nature?  They  voted  the  planters  twopence 

62 


OUT  OF  OBSCURITY 

per  pound  for  the  tobacco,  and  everybody  was  satisfied. 
Tradition,  in  fact,  had  made  twopence  the  standard 
price.  Yet  here  were  the  clergy  jarring  the  very  floor 
of  heaven  because,  forsooth,  twopence  was  not  enough 
for  them! 

It  is  a  mistake  to  suppose  that  the  dispute  was  between 
the  aristocrats  and  the  rabble.  In  the  House  of  Bur 
gesses  were  many  vestrymen,  and  other  vestrymen 
throughout  the  colony  were  against  the  clergy.  More 
important  than  the  parsons,  sometimes  better  educated, 
substantial  in  every  sense — these  squires  were  aware  of 
a  change  then  pending  in  the  relations  between  the  regal 
government  and  their  own  colony.  Had  not  James  Otis 
in  Boston  just  made  his  powerful  speech  against  gen 
eral  search  warrants?  And  why  should  the  King,  an 
absentee,  traverse  the  judgment  of  men  on  the  spot? 
Ships  could  go  and  come;  but  to  be  at  the  mercy  of 
the  whimsical  ocean  winds  and  of  men  in  England  even 
more  whimsical  was  a  hard  condition.  If  it  were  a 
crime  to  misread  the  King's  instructions  or  disobey 
them,  it  was  a  greater  crime  to  misgovern  a  people 
whose  happiness  or  misery  depended  upon  the  enact 
ment  of  measures  affecting  all.  Thinking  thus,  many 
Virginians  regarded  the  emergency  device  of  the  Bur 
gesses  as  an  act  of  forethought,  wisdom,  and  justice. 
A  few,  especially  in  Hanover,  went  further.  Was  it 
right  to  tax  money  out  of  a  man's  purse  in  support  of  a 
creed  to  which  his  conscience  was  hostile  ?  No ;  it  was 
wrong.  It  was  an  extortion.  Custom,  the  King,  and 
certain  complacent  folk  who  fortified  themselves  behind 
conventional  godliness,  and  flattered  themselves  that 
they  were  on  the  side  of  heaven,  were  easy  as  to  the 
tax;  but  the  common  mind  was  aware  of  its  lack  of 
basis  in  reason,  and  the  dissenters  were  keenly  alive 
to  its  injustice. 

But  "  it  takes  men  a  weary  while,"  says  John  Fiske, 
63 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

"to  learn  the  wickedness  of  anything  that  puts  gold  into 
their  purses ;  "  and  some  of  the  Virginia  parsons,  reas 
sured  by  the  King's  disallowance  of  the  Twopenny 
Act,  went  confidently  into  court. 

The  chief  of  these  cases  was  instituted  by  the  Rev. 
James  Maury,  who  on  April  i,  1762,  brought  suit  in 
the  County  Court  of  Hanover  against  Thomas  Johnson 
and  Tarlton  Brown,  collectors  of  the  levies  in  the  parish 
of  Fredericksville,  Louisa  County.  Mr.  Maury,  who 
taught  Jefferson,*  and  gave  him  his  first  inkling  of 
America's  future  greatness,  was  a  man  of  high  standing. 
Through  his  mother,  a  Fontaine,  he  came  of  the  Mana- 
kintown  Huguenots.  Mark  the  quaintness  of  this  auto 
biographical  bit :  "  I  am  planted  about  two  miles  to 
the  northeast  of  Walker's,  under  the  Southwest  Moun 
tains,  in  Louisa,  close  by  one  of  the  head  springs  of  the 
main  northern  branch  of  the  Pamunkey,  which  runs 
through  my  grounds — a  very  wholesome,  pleasant, 
fertile  situation,  where,  I  thank  God,  I  enjoy  more 
blessings  and  comforts  than  I  deserve."  Among  his 
blessings  were  twelve  children,  and  it  may  be  put  down 
to  his  credit  that  a  parson  with  twelve  children  is  justi 
fied  even  in  going  to  law  to  get  his  pay.  Why  this 
patriarch  (whose  grandson,  Matthew  Fontaine  Maury, 
became  one  of  mankind's  greatest  benefactors)  turned 
his  back  upon  his  own  country  to  bring  suit  in  Hanover, 
among  the  dissenters,  is  not  clear.  But  it  is  clear 
enough  that  he  put  his  case  in  good  hands.  His  counsel 

*  Maury  kept  a  school  in  Walker  parish,  where  he  taught 
"  five  boys  who  became  signers  of  the  Declaration  of  Independ 
ence."  Three  of  them  got  to  be  President  of  the  United  States. 
It  is  said  that  Maury  pointed  out  to  Jefferson  that  there  must 
be  a  great  river  where  the  Missouri  was  afterwards  discovered. 
He  filled  Jefferson's  mind  with  the  glorious  possibilities  of  the 
great  West,  then  little  known.  See  the  "  Life  of  Matthew 
Fontaine  Maury,"  by  his  daughter,  Diana  Fontaine  Maury 
Corbin. 

64 


OUT  OF  OBSCURITY 

was  Peter  Lyons,  "  renowned  for  his  refined  polite 
ness,"  who  was  then  well  up  towards  the  head  of  the 
bar  and  subsequently  became  President  of  the  Virginia 
Court  of  Appeals.  Lyons,  born  in  Ireland,  was  the 
son-in-law  of  James  Power,  probably  the  leading  lawyer 
in  America  at  that  time  and  certainly  the  possessor  of 
the  finest  law  library  on  the  continent.  Being  fond  of 
Henry,  Lyons  called  him  "  Young  Pat."  The  one  died 
and  was  buried  at  the  place  where  the  other  was  born, 
"  Studley  " — long  the  Lyons  homestead. 

The  counsel  for  the  defence,  John  Lewis,  claimed 
that  the  collectors  had  strictly  complied  with  the  act  of 
September  14,  1758.  But  the  King  had  disallowed  the 
act;  so  the  plaintiff  demurred.  After  argument,  No 
vember  5,  1763,  the  court  sustained  the  demurrer.  The 
act  was  declared  null  and  void.  It  was  "  very  much  to 
their  credit,"  thinks  Mr.  Wirt,  that  the  court  thus 
"  breasted  the  popular  current."  Apparently,  Parson 
Maury  had  won.  So  thought  Mr.  Lewis,  at  least;  for 
he  spoke  of  the  case  as  hopeless.  Nevertheless,  a  con 
cluding  step  was  necessary.  On  the  first  day  of  Decem 
ber  a  special  jury  was  to  examine  whether  the  plaintiff 
had  sustained  any  damages,  and  what.  So  the  defend 
ants  employed  Patrick  Henry  to  plead  before  the  jury 
in  their  behalf.  He  was  their  forlorn  hope. 

If  we  should  put  ourselves  in  the  places  of  some  of 
those  who  in  great  numbers,  riding  on  horseback  or  in 
coaches,  gigs,  or  carts,  moved  towards  the  Court-house 
on  the  Monday  morning  fixed  upon  for  the  award  of 
damages,  we  should  see  and  hear  much  to  entertain  us. 
To  realize  the  scene,  we  must  place  perukes  on  the  heads 
of  the  gentlemen  in  coaches  and  Hogarthian  clothes  on 
all.  We  must  restore  the  trees  so  as  to  bring  back  a 
Virginia  wilderness — brown  leaves  under  the  oaks, 
scarlet  on  the  sumac,  and  red  berries  on  the  holly.  But 
the  chief  colors  would  be  the  dark  greens  of  the  cedar 
5  65 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

and  pine  and  the  light  yellow  of  waving  sedge  thick  upon 
abandoned  fields.  If  we  were  in  the  road  that  led  past 
the  Patrick  Henry  store,  we  should  descend  a  hill,  ford 
a  creek,  take  a  gentle  rise  to  a  village  of  scattering 
houses,  and  either  join  the  crowd  at  the  tavern  or  the 
greater  crowd  on  the  Court-house  green  just  across  the 
way.  A  storm  swept  this  green  of  a  grove  of  ancient 
locust  trees  some  years  ago,  but  the  old  Court-house 
stands  as  it  stood  then — a  squat,  substantial,  roomy 
building  of  English  brick.  Quaint  arched  openings 
admit  one  to  a  paved  porch,  and  this  to  the  court-room. 
At  the  time  of  the  trial  of  the  "  Parsons'  Cause,"  half 
of  the  court-room  floor-space  was  bricked  and  bench- 
less,  so  that  many  of  the  spectators  must  have  stood. 
In  the  court-yard  that  morning  were  assembled  great 
numbers  of  the  best  people  of  the  two  parishes  of  Han 
over,  as  well  as  some  from  parishes  a  long  way  off. 
There  were  planters  in  velvet  with  powdered  hair,  long 
queues,  and  white  top-boots,  and  there  were  planters  in 
homespun — rough-and-ready  gentry  who  could  fix  a 
gaff  as  skilfully  as  they  could  crack  a  whip  or  plough 
a  furrow.  "  The  decision  upon  the  demurrer,"  we  are 
told,  "  had  produced  a  violent  ferment  among  the  peo 
ple,  and  equal  exultation  on  the  part  of  the  clergy,  who 
attended  the  court  in  a  large  body,  either  to  look  down 
opposition,  or  to  enjoy  the  final  triumph  of  this  hard- 
fought  contest,  which  they  now  considered  as  perfectly 
secure."  Before  the  court-crier  had  spoken  his  "  Oyez ! 
oyez !  "  twenty  of  the  parsons  had  appeared ;  and  now, 
as  it  is  interesting  to  note,  another  came  riding  up  in 
his  carriage — the  Rev.  Patrick  Henry.  His  nephew 
and  namesake  was  at  that  moment  in  the  court-yard 
throng,  with  Colonel  Samuel  Meredith.  Together  they 
approached  the  carriage,  and,  before  its  occupant  could 
alight,  Patrick  Junior  begged  Patrick  Senior  not  to 
come  into  court  that  day. 

66 


OUT  OF  OBSCURITY 

"Why?"  asked  the  elder. 

"  Because  I  am  engaged  in  opposition  to  the  clergy," 
said  Patrick  Junior ;  "  and  your  appearance  there  might 
strike  me  with  such  awe  as  to  prevent  me  from  doing 
justice  to  my  clients." 

"  Rather  than  that  effect  should  be  produced,"  said 
Patrick  Senior,  "  I  will  not  only  absent  myself  from  the 
Court-house,  but  will  return  home." 

Whereupon  he  reined  about,  and  drove  off  towards 
his  glebe. 

Soon  thereafter,  court  opened.  The  room  was  filled, 
and  many  stood  in  the  doorway.  On  the  bench  sat 
Colonel  John  Henry,  the  presiding  justice,  flanked  by 
the  other  justices.  It  was  a  long  bench,  and  upon  it  the 
twenty  clergymen  found  places.  The  Rev.  Alexander 
White,  who  had  lost  a  similar  suit  in  King  William 
County,  was  one  of  the  twenty.  Confident  though  they 
were,  they  wished  to  see  the  final  act  in  a  judicial  drama 
that  meant  so  much  to  their  purses  and  prestige.  We 
can  see  the  twenty  grave  and  learned  ministers  as  they 
thus  sat  in  a  long  row  side  by  side.  Under  their  wigs 
there  was  no  thought  of  disaster. 

But  the  parson-plaintiff,  sitting  with  his  counsel  in 
the  bar,  was  less  at  ease.  No  sooner  was  the  case  called 
than  he  grew  anxious  as  to  the  character  of  the  jury. 
The  sheriff  went  forth  to  summon  the  twelve  men.  He 
entered  a  public  room  full  of  "  gentlemen  "  and  told  his 
errand.  One  excused  himself;  the  others  he  let  alone. 
He  met  a  "  gentleman  "  on  the  green  and  made  shift 
to  do  without  him.  "  Hence,"  complains  Mr.  Maury, 
"  he  went  among  the  vulgar  herd.  After  he  had  selected 
and  set  down  upon  his  list  about  eight  or  ten  of  these, 
I  met  him  with  it  in  his  hand,  and  on  looking  over  it, 
observed  to  him  that  they  were  not  such  jurors  as  the 
court  had  directed  him  to  get.  .  .  .  Nay,  though 
I  objected  against  them,  yet,  as  Patrick  Henry,  one  of 

67 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

the  defendants'  lawyers,  insisted  they  were  honest  men, 
and,  therefore,  unexceptionable,  they  were  immediately 
called  to  the  book  and  sworn."  Three  of  them  were 
"  New  Lights  " — George  Dabney,  Samuel  Morris,  and 
Roger  Shackelford;  but  what  had  Parson  Maury 
expected  in  the  county  of  Hanover,  with  its  lingering 
echoes  of  the  great  dissenter's  eloquence  ? 

The  hearing  now  began.  Lyons,  for  Maury,  intro 
duced  the  bond  of  the  defendants  as  collectors  and  the 
vestry's  order  for  a  levy,  1759,  in  behalf  of  the  plaintiff. 
Then  he  examined  two  tobacco-dealers,  to  determine 
the  price  of  tobacco  that  year,  and  rested  his  evidence. 
The  defence  introduced  Maury's  receipt  for  the  sum 
paid,  and  rested  its  evidence.  It  appeared  that  while 
Maury  had  received  but  £144,  he  was  entitled  to  three 
times  that  sum.  So  Judge  Lyons  urged  in  the  plea 
which  he  forthwith  made  to  the  jury.  Having,  in  con 
clusion,  eulogized  the  ministers  of  the  Anglican  Church 
throughout  the  Old  Dominion,  the  accomplished  and 
graceful  speaker  resumed  his  seat. 

Then  Henry  arose.  His  manner  was  in  unhappy 
contrast  with  that  of  his  antagonist.  Through  the  eyes 
of  tradition  we  can  see  him  now  as  he  stood  abashed 
before  the  court,  the  array  of  clerical  dignitaries,  and 
the  pack  of  people  who  looked  upon  him  neither  with 
favor  nor  in  disfavor,  but  tolerantly,  excusing  his  youth, 
his  awkwardness,  and  his  faltering  tongue. 

For  Patrick  faltered.  The  words  he  wished  to  use 
ilew  out  of  his  reach.  There  were  hesitations.  There 
were  pauses.  People  hung  their  heads.  The  parsons 
gave  sidelong  glances  at  each  other,  up  and  down  their 
bench.  It  was  a  sly  if  mute  way  of  saying :  :(  The 
bumpkin !  Look  at  him !  What  have  we  to  fear  from 
such  a  man  ?  "  His  father,  ashamed  of  him,  sank  back 
in  his  seat.  This,  then,  was  that  son  of  his  who  had 
plunged  into  the  law !  Evidently  Patrick's  talents  were 

68 


OUT  OF  OBSCURITY 

better  suited  to  stump-grubbing  on  "  Pine  Slash  "  farm. 
Sorry  news  for  his  mother,  this ;  a  mortifying  situation. 

But  in  a  few  moments  Patrick  mastered  his  tongue. 
Fortunately,  there  was  that  in  his  voice  which  was  as  a 
challenge  to  the  listener,  be  he  friendly  or  hostile.  It 
was  a  manly  voice,  free  from  artificialities,  and  there 
was  an  appeal  in  it.  No  sooner  had  he  found  his  lost 
words  than  he  began  to  put  them  together  and  modulate 
them  and  send  them  where  he  pleased.  It  was  a  send 
ing  voice — it  fell  pleasantly  upon  the  ears  of  those  who 
sat  beside  him,  and  at  the  same  time  reached  the  ears 
of  those  who,  standing  in  the  court-yard,  pressed 
inward  or  tiptoed  to  get  a  glimpse  of  the  scene.  Some 
old  farmer  on  the  outskirts  of  the  crowd  might  well  have 
said :  "  With  that  voice  of  his,  Patrick  could  make 
love  in  a  corner,  or  call  a  hound  a  mile  away."  The 
very  pauses,  at  first  so  painful,  because  they  foretokened 
a  breakdown,  now  became  effective.  They  had  a  pur 
pose — these  later  pauses.  They  meant :  "  Is  not  this 
true,  my  friends?  Think  a  moment — your  heads  are 
your  own.  These  things  I  have  just  said  to  you — are 
they  not  so?  Come,  in  all  conscience,  now,  are  they 
not  God's  truth  ?  "  It  was  like  the  act  of  a  hunter  who, 
running  on  ahead,  would  stop,  turn,  and  beckon  to  those 
who  followed.  So  the  people  in  the  court-room  fol 
lowed  Patrick  in  his  argument;  and  when  he  paused, 
they  closed  up  quickly,  eager  to  move  on. 

As  yet,  however,  the  twenty  parsons  on  the  bench 
were  not  at  all  distressed.  To  them  this  was  a 
harangue — an  ad  captandum  talk,  incapable  of  effect. 
Some  were  unappreciative  of  the  power  of  sincere 
speech  upon  the  breasts  of  men.  They  themselves  were 
much  given  to  thrusting  their  noses  down  towards  the 
lectern  and  droning  the  Word  of  God  into  the  cushion. 
They  felt,  too,  that  the  upstart  and  intemperate  orator 
was  beyond  his  depth.  What!  This  youth  who  but 

69 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

lately  had  swung  a  plow,  and  wormed  tobacco,  dis 
coursing  on  the  duties  of  his  Majesty  the  King  of 
England ! 

Sure  enough,  Patrick  was  essaying  much  and  risking 
much.  Few  of  his  spoken  words  have  come  down  to  us, 
but  his  argument  ran :  There  was  a  mutuality  of  obli 
gation  upon  King  and  people.  Between  them  there 
were  binding  covenants  tantamount  to  a  solemn  con 
tract.  It  was  for  the  King  to  protect;  it  was  for  the 
people  to  sustain  and  obey.  If  either  broke  a  covenant, 
then  was  the  other  free  from  obligation.  In  Virginia 
the  Burgesses  were  the  House  of  Commons ;  the  Council 
the  House  of  Lords ;  the  Governor  the  King.  The  law 
of  1758,  approved  by  Burgesses,  Council,  and  Governor, 
was  a  good  law,  a  salutary  law,  a  valid  law — and  its 
disallowance  by  King  George  was  an  instance  of 
misrule. 

At  this  stage  a  great  change  came  over  him.  His 
mind  seemed  to  gain  a  glow  from  its  own  action ;  and 
now,  says  Wirt,  "  was  first  witnessed  that  mysterious 
and  almost  supernatural  transformation  of  appearance 
which  the  fire  of  his  own  eloquence  never  failed  to 
work  in  him."  His  attitude  became  erect  and  lofty; 
his  action  graceful  and  commanding;  his  voice  a  ver 
itable  power  and  persuasion.  Genius  lit  him  and  flashed 
from  him,  and  what  he  did  as  well  as  what  he  said  served 
to  infect,  to  thrill,  to  captivate.  Some  twenty  minutes 
before,  he  had  been  as  a  lout  in  his  own  father's  eyes ; 
now  tears  ran  down  his  father's  cheeks.  All  the  jus 
tices  bent  forward.  Every  one  now  recognized  the 
presence  there  of  a  great  orator. 

He  continued,  still  boldly  speaking  of  the  sovereign. 
What  of  a  king  who  disallows  a  salutary  act  such  as 
the  act  at  issue?  He  ceases  to  be  the  father  of  his 
people.  He  forfeits  all  right  to  the  obedience  of  his 
isubjects.  He  degenerates  into  a  tyrant. 

70 


(King's  counsel  in  the  "  Parsons'  Cause."  He  succeeded  Judge  Edmund 
Pendleton  as  President  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  Appeals  of  Virginia.  From 
Thomas  Sully's  painting,  in  the  court-room  at  Richmond.) 


OUT  OF  OBSCURITY 

Judge  Lyons   arose   in   heat. 

"  The  gentleman  has  spoken  treason,"  he  cried,  "  and 
I  am  astonished  that  your  Worships  can  hear  it  without 
emotion  or  any  mark  of  dissatisfaction." 

"  Treason,  treason,"  came  in  a  murmur  from  behind 
the  bar. 

But  the  justices  refused  to  stay  the  orator,  who  now 
turned  upon  the  clergy.  It  was  their  work  in  life,  he 
said,  to  safeguard  the  people  in  high  matters  unregu 
lated  by  the  secular  laws.  If  they  failed  in  this,  they 
failed  in  everything,  and  were  of  no  use  in  the  great 
body  politic.  Was  a  clergyman  to  set  an  example  of 
selfishness ;  to  want  more  than  his  lay  brother ;  to  become 
a  grasper,  a  worldling?  Was  such  a  clergyman  serving 
God  or  was  he  serving  himself?  Shame  upon  greed — 
shame  especially  upon  pulpit  greed !  "  We  have  heard 
a  great  deal,"  he  said,  "  about  the  benevolence  and  holy 
zeal  of  our  reverend  clergy,  but  how  is  this  manifested  ? 
Do  they  manifest  their  zeal  in  the  cause  of  religion  and 
humanity  by  practising  the  mild  and  benevolent  pre 
cepts  of  the  Gospel  of  Jesus  ?  Do  they  feed  the  hungry 
and  clothe  the  naked  ?  Oh,  no,  gentlemen !  Instead 
of  feeding  the  hungry  and  clothing  the  naked,  these 
rapacious  harpies  would,  were  their  power  equal  to  their 
will,  snatch  from  the  hearth  of  their  honest  parishioner 
his  last  hoe-cake,  from  the  widow  and  her  orphan  chil 
dren  her  last  milch  cow!  the  last  bed — nay,  the  last 
blanket,  from  the  lying-in  woman !  " 

This  was  more  than  the  clergymen  present  could 
stand.  At  once  they  got  up  from  their  bench  and  filed 
out  into  the  court-yard.  But  Henry  heeded  neither  the 
cries  of  "  treason  "  nor  the  rebuke  from  the  clergymen. 
He  went  on  and  on — now  persuasive,  now  vehement. 
His  plea  lasted  nearly  an  hour.  He  spoke  of  the  bond 
age  of  the  people,  and  warned  the  jury  that  unless  they 
seized  upon  the  opportunity  now  at  hand  to  sustain  the 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

liberties  of  the  Commonwealth,  they  would  rivet  their 
own  chains — perpetuate  their  own  servitude.  Yes,  they 
must  find  for  the  plaintiff;  but  let  it  be  for  no  more 
than  one  farthing.  One  farthing  would  suffice.  And 
that  was  the  end. 

In  vain  did  Judge  Lyons,  who  at  once  arose,  seek  to 
lessen  the  effect  of  the  powerful  plea.  The  jury  was 
hardly  out  before  it  was  in  again  with  its  verdict — one 
penny  damages. 

The  victory  was  complete;  for  though  the  parsons 
would  appeal  to  the  General  Court,  what  good  would  it 
do  them?  The  matter  would  go  to  the  King,  but  his 
Majesty  would  think  twice  before  provoking  rebellion 
in  such  a  cause. 

There  now  followed  a  hearty  ovation  to  the  orator. 
In  spite  of  the  sheriff's  cries,  an  uproar  arose.  The 
people  pressed  around  Henry,  seized  him,  lifted  him  to 
willing  shoulders,  and,  with  shouts  of  jubilation,  bore 
him  into  the  court-yard,  where  he  was  so  lionized  that 
his  head  would  surely  have  been  turned  had  he  been 
a  less  sensible  man. 

Not  only  was  he  proof  against  this  flattery,  but  he 
had  it  in  heart  to  go  find  good  Air.  Maury  and  beg  his 
pardon  for  whatever  offence  he  might  have  given  him 
in  assailing  the  gentlemen  of  the  cloth.  And  just  here 
there  comes  in  a  curious  matter  upon  which  the  student 
of  Patrick  Henry's  character  may  speculate  as  he 
pleases.  "  He  apologized  to  me  for  what  he  had  said," 
writes  Maury  to  his  friend  Camm,  "  alleging  that  his 
sole  view  in  engaging  in  the  cause,  and  in  saying  what 
he  had,  was  to  render  himself  popular.  You  see,  then/' 
he  adds,  "  it  is  so  clear  a  point  in  this  person's  opinion 
that  the  ready  road  to  popularity  here  is  to  trample 
underfoot  the  interests  of  religion,  the  rights  of  the 
church,  and  the  prerogatives  of  the  crown." 

Smarting  under  defeat,  Mr.  Maury  may  have  made 
72 


OUT  OF  OBSCURITY 

more  out  of  a  chance  remark,  uttered  in  excitement, 
than  was  meant  by  the  orator,  who  certainly  was  not  a 
demagogue.  So  good  an  authority  as  Charles  Campbell 
says  that  Henry  "  endeared  himself  to  the  people, 
though  he  never  courted  their  favor  by  flattery."  It  is 
doubtless  true  that  popularity  was  sweet  to  him ;  and 
it  is  a  further  fact  that  the  wish  to  get  on  in  the  law 
led  him  to  smother  his  compunctions  in  this  instance 
and  voice  the  radicalism  of  rising  democracy. 

But  whether  Patrick  sought  to  placate  Mr.  Maury  on 
account  of  Episcopal  friendship  or  good-heartedness  or 
remorse,  there  is  no  reason  to  think  that  he  did  so 
through  fear.  For  a  while,  indeed,  the  parsons  were  of 
the  mind  to  have  him  up  for  treason;  but  retaliation 
was  impracticable.*  He  lost  a  few  friends,  but  gained 
many,  adding  164  new  clients  to  his  list  within  a  year. 
Whether  his  first  client,  Mr.  Cootes,  of  Cootes  and 
Crosse,  a  Scotch  merchant  and  sturdy  King's  man,  ever 
forgave  him  does  not  appear.  After  court,  Mr.  Cootes 
declared  that  "  he  would  have  given  a  considerable  sum 
out  of  his  own  pocket,  rather  than  that  his  friend  Patrick 
should  have  been  guilty  of  a  crime  but  little,  if  anything, 
inferior  to  that  which  brought  Simon,  Lord  Lovat,  to 
the  block  " ;  adding  that  the  culprit  "  exceeded  the  most 
seditious  and  inflammatory  harangues  of  the  tribunes 
of  old  Rome."  Much  milder  was  the  paternal  com 
ment.  We  have  said  that  Colonel  John  Henry  refuses 
to  palpitate  under  the  hand.  His  remark  to  Judge 
Edmund  Winston  was  that  Patrick  spoke  "  in  a  manner 
that  surprised  me,  and  showed  himself  well  informed 
on  a  subject  of  which  I  did  not  know  he  had  any  knowl- 

*  "  It  is  amusing,"  says  Howison,  "  to  note  in  Dr.  Hawks  the 
struggle  between  his  admiration  for  Henry's  genius  and  his 
evident  disgust  at  his  success.  He  insists  much  upon  the 
demurrer,  and  expresses  the  horror  of  a  lawyer  at  the  wide 
field  of  discussion  which  Henry  assumed." 

73 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

edge."  The  Hanover  people  at  large  were  more  appre 
ciative  of  Patrick's  rare  eloquence.  In  that  county  it 
was  long  customary  to  say  of  some  orator :  "  He  is 
almost  equal  to  Patrick  Henry  when  he  plead  against 
the  parsons."  His  antagonist,  Judge  Lyons,  also  appre 
ciated  him,  saying :  "  I  could  write  a  letter  or  draw  a 
declaration  or  plea  at  the  bar  with  as  much  accuracy 
as  I  could  in  my  office,  under  all  circumstances,  except 
when  Patrick  rose  to  speak ;  but  whenever  he  rose, 
although  it  might  be  on  so  trifling  a  subject  as  a  sum 
mons  and  petition  for  twenty  shillings,  I  was  obliged 
to  lay  down  my  pen,  and  could  not  write  another  word 
until  the  speech  was  finished." 

Summing  up  on  the  "  Parsons*  Cause,"  we  find  that 
it  gave  impetus  to  popular  government  and  lifted  the 
orator  of  the  Revolution  out  of  an  obscurity  in  which 
he  might  otherwise  have  remained.  The  Established 
Church  exists  in  England  to  this  day,  but  in  America 
the  very  idea  is  archaic.  When  we  seek  to  get  at  the 
mental  habitude  of  the  parsons  of  Henry's  time,  we 
feel  that  we  are  dealing  with  an  age  long  past.  On  the 
other  hand,  when  we  come  to  consider  Henry's  own 
outlook  upon  man  and  government,  we  find  it  like 
that  of  the  present.  His  was  the  onward  tendency. 
His  light  came  out  of  the  future.  He  thought  as  we 
think;  or,  rather,  we  think  as  he  did,  for  he  was  a 
pioneer  in  fundamental  American  ideas.  It  was  he  who 
in  the  face  of  custom  brought  together  various  new 
elements  and  vitalized  them.  As  Campbell  puts  it: 
"  Henry's  speech  in  the  '  Parsons'  Cause,'  and  the  ver 
dict  of  the  jury,  may  be  said  in  a  certain  sense  to  have 
been  the  commencement  of  the  Revolution  in  Virginia ; 
and  Hanover,  where  dissent  had  appeared,  was  the 
starting-point." 


74 


THE    ORATOR    OF    NATURE THE    STAMP    ACT 

FAME  was  less  volatile  then  than  now.  There  were 
no  daily  newspapers ;  there  was  infrequent  use  for  the 
word  "  million  " ;  there  was  no  congestion  of  celebrities. 
If  in  one  sense  Patrick  Henry's  world  were  smaller 
than  ours,  in  another  sense  it  was  larger.  People  did 
not  see  in  electric  glimpses,  as  we  do ;  they  looked  at 
a  thing  more  leisurely,  more  steadfastly;  they  learned 
to  measure  well ;  they  remembered  for  a  year  what  we 
forget  in  a  day. 

By  hearsay  repute,  Henry  at  twenty-eight  was  the 
"  Orator  of  Nature  " ;  but  in  the  main  his  laurels  were 
local  to  Hanover — not  yet  fully  Virginian.  He  still 
wore  his  old  coat.  He  still  had  his  way  to  make  among 
the  men  who  dominated  affairs  at  Williamsburg.  These 
chief  men  of  the  colony  stood  on  ground  apart — the 
superior  ground  of  aristocratic  cousinship,  wealth, 
knowledge,  power,  and  a  long  familiarity  with  the 
methods  of  London  officialdom.  They  were  rural,  it  is 
true;  but  some  of  them  were  elegantly  rural,  whereas 
Henry  was  so  rustic  as  to  see  no  crime  in  a  worn  sleeve 
or  a  misfit  wig. 

Perhaps  he  would  not  have  gone  among  these  men  so 
soon  after  his  Hanover  triumph  if  a  client  had  not  re 
quired  his  services  at  Williamsburg.  In  the  fall  of 
1764  he  journeyed  thither  to  represent  Captain  Nathaniel 
West  Dandridge,  who  was  contesting  the  seat  of  James 
Littlepage  in  the  House  of  Burgesses.  "  Bribery  and 
corruption  "  was  the  charge  against  Littlepage,  whose 
name  serves  as  an  interesting  reminder.  Those  who, 
being  in  search  of  romantic  characters,  have  shaken 

75 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

much  dust  out  of  old  books  and  old  documents  will 
recall  that  a  Hanover  Littlepage  once  supplied  the 
novelists  with  a  new  sort  of  American  hero.  But  as 
the  hero  under  present  consideration  is  Patrick  himself, 
it  is  incumbent  upon  us  to  go  with  him  to  the  Capitol 
and  see  how  he  fared  in  the  presence  of  the  Com 
mittee  on  Privileges  and  Elections.  It  is  the  clear 
headed  and  sharp-eyed  Judge  John  Tyler  who  once  more 
speaks  for  us : 

"  The  proud  airs  of  aristocracy,  added  to  the  dignified  forms 
of  that  truly  august  body,  were  enough  to  have  deterred  any 
man  possessing  less  firmness  and  independence  of  spirit  than 
Mr.  Henry.  He  was  ushered  with  great  state  and  ceremony 
into  the  room  of  the  committee,  whose  chairman  was  Colonel 
Bland.  Mr.  Henry  was  dressed  in  very  coarse  apparel ;  no 
one  knew  anything  of  him,  and  scarcely  was  he  treated  with 
decent  respect  by  any  one  except  the  chairman,  who  could  not 
do  so  much  violence  to  his  feelings  and  principles  as  to  depart, 
on  any  occasion,  from  the  delicacy  of  the  gentleman.  But  the 
general  contempt  was  soon  changed  into  a  general  admiration, 
for  Mr.  Henry  distinguished  himself  by  a  copious  and  brilliant 
display  on  the  great  subject  of  the  rights  of  suffrage,  superior 
to  anything  that  had  been  heard  before  within  those  walls. 
Such  a  burst  of  eloquence  from  a  man  so  very  plain  and  ordi 
nary  in  appearance  struck  the  committee  with  amazement,  so 
that  a  deep  and  perfect  silence  took  place  during  the  speech, 
and  not  a  sound,  but  from  his  lips,  was  to  be  heard  in  the 
room." 

Judge  Winston  also  tells  of  Henry's  rusticity  and 
winsomeness  of  speech : 

"  Some  time  after,  a  member  of  the  House,  speaking  to  me 
of  this  occurrence,  said  he  had  for  a  day  or  two  observed  an 
ill-dressed  young  man  sauntering  in  the  lobby,  that  he  seemed 
to  be  a  stranger  to  everybody,  and  he  had  not  the  curiosity  to 
inquire  his  name,  but  that  attending  when  the  case  of  a  con 
tested  election  came  on,  he  was  surprised  to  find  this  same 
person  counsel  for  one  of  the  parties,  and  still  more  so  when 
he  delivered  an  argument  superior  to  anything  he  ever  heard." 

76 


THE  ORATOR  OF  NATURE 

Such  was  Henry's  introduction  to  the  Capitol.  In 
a  few  months  he  will  have  returned  as  a  member  from 
Louisa  County,  so  Williamsburg  remains  the  scene  for 
us.  And  as  a  great  drama,  with  continental  involvement, 
was  opened  there  in  1765,  it  is  desirable  that  the  town, 
and  the  Virginia  peninsula  midmost  of  which  it  stood, 
shall  pass  under  the  eye. 

Dr.  Lyon  Gardiner  Tyler  speaks  of  the  country  be 
tween  James  River  and  the  York  as  "  the  cradle  of  the 
Union."  No  one  need  demur  at  this,  nor  yet  cry  "  brag ! " 
Some  things  are  really  so.  The  old  piney  peninsula 
was  the  scene  of  the  first  settlement  in  English  America, 
the  first  legislative  assembly,  the  first  trial  by  jury,  the 
first  habeas  corpus  case,  and  the  first  protest  against 
tyranny.  It  was  the  place  whence  Americans  first  pro 
claimed  their  fundamental  doctrine,  "  No  representation, 
no  tax."  If  John  Harvard  had  permitted,  it  would 
have  had  the  first  college.  It  grew  the  first  cotton.  It 
humanely  built  the  first  asylum  for  the  insane.  Were 
not  the  theme  somewhat  too  extrinsic  for  these  pages, 
many  another  "  first "  might  be  added ;  and,  indeed,  it 
is  pertinent  as  well  as  important  to  refer  to  one  more. 
Here  also  sprang  up  the  first  American  "  rebel  " — Na 
thaniel  Bacon,  a  man  with  a  spirit  so  like  Henry's  that 
it  is  essential  to  take  account  of  him.  Bear  in  mind 
that  Sir  William  Berkeley,  at  that  time  Governor,  per 
mitted  the  Indians  to  ravage  the  border.  Bacon,  in  his 
wrath,  beat  back  the  savages,  then  turned  upon  the  mis 
governing  deputy  of  a  distant  King.  Here  is  the 
young  rebel's  manifesto,  issued  while  at  war  with  the 
passionate  old  cavalier: 

"  If  virtue  be  a  sin,  if  piety  be  guilt,  if  all  the  principles  of 
morality  and  goodness  be  perverted,  we  must  confess  that 
those  who  are  now  called  '  Rebels  '  may  be  in  danger  of  this 
high  imputation;  but  if  there  be,  as  sure  there  is,  a  just  God 
to  appeal  to,  if  to  plead  the  cause  of  the  oppressed,  if  sincerely 

77 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

to  aim  at  his  Majesty's  honor  and  the  public  good  without 
any  reservation  or  by-interest,  if  to  stand  in  the  gap  after  so 
much  blood  of  our  dear  brethren  bought  and  sold,  if,  after  the 
loss  of  a  great  part  of  his  Majesty's  Colony  deserted  and  dis 
peopled,  freely  with  our  lives  and  estates  to  endeavor  to  save 
the  remainder — [if  this]  be  treason,  God  Almighty  judge  and 
let  the  guilty  die." 

But  the  rebellion  went  to  pieces;  Bacon  died;  and 
Berkeley — then  at  "  Harop,"  or  the  "  Middle  Planta 
tion,"  Jamestown  being  in  ashes — revenged  himself  by 
executing  Bacon's  friends.  "  Mr.  Drummond,"  said 
Berkeley  to  the  chief  of  these,  "  you  are  very  welcome. 
I  am  more  glad  to  see  you  than  any  man  in  Virginia. 
Mr.  Drummond,  you  shall  be  hanged  in  half  an  hour." 
Sure  enough,  the  excellent  Drummond  was  stripped, 
his  ring  was  torn  from  his  ringer,  and  his  spirited  and 
patriotic  wife  was  speedily  made  a  widow. 

The  spot  where  Drummond  died  was  on  the  back 
bone  of  the  peninsula,  ninety  feet  higher  than  unlucky 
and  unhealthy  Jamestown.  It  was  an  inviting  place, 
altogether  free  from  "  the  Annoyance  of  Muskettoes." 
From  this  ridge  one  creek  ran  three  miles  south  to  the 
James ;  another  ran  four  miles  north  to  the  York.  Soon 
Bruton  church  was  built  there ;  next,  the  "  Royal  Col- 
ledge,"  designed  by  Sir  Christopher  Wren ;  then  a 
spacious  Capitol.  Jamestown,  in  fact,  was  transplanted 
— it  became  Williamsburg. 

All  who  knew  Burgess  Patrick  Henry,  and  wrote  of 
him  or  passed  on  down  their  opinions  concerning  him, 
agree  as  to  one  characteristic — he  habitually  looked  about 
him  with  sharp  eyes.  What  he  saw  when  he  came  to  the 
capital  in  May,  1765,  was  not  a  city  laid  out  "  in  the 
form  of  a  cypher  made  of  W  and  M  " — the  initials  of 
William  and  Mary — as  had  been  fancifully  proposed,  but 
a  well-gardened  town  with  one  great  street,  stretching 
along  the  ridge  for  nearly  a  mile.  At  the  extreme  west 

78 


THE  ORATOR  OF  NATURE 

end  of  this  avenue  was  the  College ;  at  the  extreme  east 
end  the  Capitol.  It  was  Duke  of  Gloucester  Street, 
ninety  feet  wide,  lined  with  shade-trees  and  enlivened 
with  the  traffic,  the  social  flow,  and  the  political  activity 
of  a  picturesque  people.  At  times  a  coach  with  postilions 
arid  outriders  stirred  its  dust.  A  Governor  was  drawn 
from  the  "  palace "  to  the  Capitol  by  six  milk-white 
horses  in  gorgeous  trappings.  There  were  viceregal 
sights  to  see  at  Williamsburg  when  the  Burgesses  were 
in  session ;  and  from  the  palace  at  this  particular  period 
came  strange  tales  to  be  told  with  zest  over  the  tables 
at  the  Raleigh  Tavern.  Governor  Francis  Fauquier,  it 
was  said,  "  gamed  furiously  "  when  he  made  his  social 
tour  among  the  rich  planters ;  "  dice  rattled,  cards  ap 
peared,  money  in  immense  sums  was  lost  and  won." 
Just  now  he  was  giving  musical  parties,  to  which  each 
guest  brought  his  violin.  Young  Thomas  Jefferson  was 
one  of  these  guests,  and  so,  in  course  of  time,  would 
Henry  be;  for  Patrick  had  by  no  means  grown  grave 
enough  to  disregard  the  scrape  of  the  fiddle. 

Yet  grave  he  must  have  been  during  the  last  ten  days 
of  that  memorable  month  of  May.  He  was  on  trial 
with  himself.  It  is  not  true,  however,  that  the  people 
had  put  him  forward  for  the  express  purpose  of  tearing 
the  Stamp  Act  to  pieces.  William  Wirt  was  wrong 
here;  and  the  painstaking  and  luminous  Howison  fell 
into  error  when  he  wrote :  "  With  a  special  view  to 
the  debate  on  the  Stamp  Act,  William  Johnson,  of 
Louisa,  vacated  his  seat  in  the  House  of  Burgesses,  and 
made  way  for  Patrick  Henry,  who  on  the  2Oth  of  May 
was  placed  on  the  Committee  for  Courts  of  Justice/'  It 
is  like  taking  the  poetry  out  of  a  fine  matter  to  deny  that 
Henry  was  purposely  sent  to  the  House  that  he  might 
discipline  King,  Lords,  and  Commons ;  for  how  much 
more  thrilling  history  would  be  if  everything  happened 
in  dramatic  sequence,  logically  and  coherently!  The 

79 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

simple  fact  is  that  Johnson  resigned  to  become  Coroner. 
No  doubt  Henry  was  selected  because  of  his  fitness  to 
fill  the  vacancy,  and  no  doubt  Grenville's  purpose  to  tax 
America  was  a  sore  subject,  but  the  House  was  in  ses 
sion  before  any  one  in  Virginia  knew  of  the  passage 
of  the  odious  act. 

Henry  spent  nine  days  in  the  House  during  this  ses 
sion.  It  is  hard  to  give  a  just  and  adequate  portraiture 
of  his  fellow-members.  The  temptation  is  to  overpraise 
them — to  exaggerate  their  nobility  of  character.  They 
belong  among  the  founders  of  the  nation.  There  is  a 
glamour  about  them.  Can  any  American  who  reads 
Hugh  Blair  Grigsby's  eulogy  of  the  members  of  the 
Convention  of  1776  doubt  his  grasp  of  fact  or  accuracy 
of  estimate  ?  Yet,  for  the  most  part,  the  same  men  who 
figure  in  his  memorabilia  were  seated  in  the  hall  of  the 
House  of  Burgesses  when  Henry  entered  it  for  the 
first  time.  It  must  be  true  that  there  was  an  exception 
ally  large  proportion  of  high-principled  men  among 
them.  But,  here,  in  this  republic,  we  are  accused  of 
inability  to  take  the  measure  of  our  heroes.  Hence  one 
may  think  that  Grigsby,  in  his  glow  of  admiration,  found 
giants  where  only  poor  human  creatures  of  common 
stature  stood.  For  the  satisfaction  of  those  who  shy  at 
the  good  Grigsby  we  shall  therefore  call  upon  an 
Englishman  of  repute  to  set  us  straight — A.  G.  Bradley, 
who  says : 

"  That  the  three  millions  of  Anglo-Saxons  then  in  America 
produced  at  that  period  a  memorable  crop  of  brilliant  men,  is 
a  fact  beyond  question.  This  excessive  supply  was  due  partly, 
no  doubt,  to  accident,  but  also  in  a  great  measure  to  the  wide 
diffusion  of  internal  responsibility.  This  again  was  abnormally 
developed  by  the  great  intercontinental  questions  which  agi 
tated  the  colonies  for  many  years." 

Next  let  us  note  a  passage  by  William  Cabell  Rives : 
80 


THE  ORATOR  OF  NATURE 

"  If  such  men  were,  in  a  certain  sense,  an  aristocracy,  it 
was  an  aristocracy  pledged  by  its  very  nature  to  the  general 
good,  and  constituted,  by  the  advantages  of  superior  fortune 
and  education,  the  vigilant  sentinels  and  faithful  guardians  of 
the  common  safety.  They  were  the  natural  leaders  of  the 
people  in  a  crisis  of  public  danger." 

All  told,  the  members  of  the  House  numbered  one 
hundred  and  sixteen.  There  were  four  Lees,  three 
Carters,  two  of  the  ancient  Digges  family,  two  Elands, 
two  Boilings,  two  Carringtons,  two  Pages,  two  Paynes, 
two  Pendletons,  and  two  Randolphs.  Hardly  a  family 
of  aristocrats  but  had  its  member. 

Washington  was  there — a  quiet  man,  who  at  once 
made  friends  with  Henry.  Much  like  Washington  in 
looks,  manners,  and  public  spirit  was  William  Cabell, 
who  lived  a  baronial  life  on  the  James.  But,  though 
big  of  body,  he  did  not  rise  in  mental  stature  to  the 
height  of  many  another  blue-eyed  six-footer  there  pres 
ent.  Perhaps  Benjamin  Harrison,  also  a  man  of  bulk, 
lacked  somewhat  in  the  intellectual  qualities  of  such 
subtle  reasoners  as  Bland,  the  constitutionalist;  but 
sound  sense,  and  that  liveliness  of  spirit  for  which  his 
family  was  known,  compensated  for  the  want.  "  I  went 
out  to  Charing  Cross  to  see  Major-General  Harrison 
hanged,  drawn,  and  quartered,"  said  Pepys,  in  his 
"  Diary  " ;  "  which  was  done  there,  he  looking  as  cheer 
ful  as  any  man  could  do  in  that  condition."  Tall  Paul 
Carrington,  whom  the  Revolutionary  struggle  made  one 
of  the  gravest,  as  he  was  one  of  the  best  of  men ;  Robert 
Carter  Nicholas,  the  leading  lawyer  of  the  colony,  and  the 
quick-tempered  Archibald  Cary,  small  of  stature,  fiery, 
with  the  handsome  looks  of  his  race — even  these  were 
less  distinguished  than  others  who  sat  below  the  dais, 
where  Speaker  John  Robinson  had  been  enchaired  for 
a  quarter  of  a  century.  Peyton  Randolph  we  have  met ; 
but  there  remain  three  celebrities  of  whom  to  tell — Lee, 
6  81 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

Pendleton,  and  Wythe.  The  chief  of. "  the  brilliant  Lee 
brotherhood  " — Richard  Henry — was  tall  and  spare.  If 
Cicero's  nose  were  "  Roman,"  then  Lee  was  like  him  in 
two  respects,  for  the  old  Virginians  affirm  that  Richard 
Henry  also  had  Cicero's  tongue.  Next,  Edmund  Pen 
dleton,  of  whom  Jefferson  says  : 

"  Taken  all  in  all,  he  was  the  ablest  man  in  debate  I  ever 
met;  he  was  cool,  smooth,  and  persuasive;  his  language  flow 
ing,  chaste,  and  embellished ;  his  conceptions  quick,  acute,  and 
full  of  resource;  add  to  this  that  he  was  one  of  the  most 
virtuous  of  men,  the  kindest  friend,  the  most  amiable  and 
pleasant  of  companions." 

Are  there  too  many  superlatives  here  ?  Jefferson  was 
by  no  means  quick  to  praise  the  men  of  his  time.  For 
fifty  years  Pendleton  served  his  country;  and  so  did 
the  same  George  Wythe  (call  it  "with")  who  had 
bowed  our  Patrick  out  when  Patrick  wanted  a  lawyer's 
license,  and  who  was  now  about  to  discover  that  appear 
ances  are  sometimes  deceptive.  Wythe  was  slender, 
with  overarching  forehead,  Roman  nose,  broad  chin,  and 
dark  gray  eyes.  His  head  was  largely  filled  with  law, 
and  what  space  law  left  was  enriched  with  the  wisdom 
of  the  ages.  Out  of  his  archaic  mouth  came  quaint  locu 
tions  pat  to  the  hour.* 

That  these  men  were  of  clay  we  all  know;  but  they 
seem  to  have  been  of  an  uncommonly  good  grade  of  it. 
Nothing  so  humanizes  them  to  our  minds  as  Jefferson's 
account  of  an  incident  in  the  House  shortly  after  Henry 
had  taken  his  seat.  It  was  proposed  to  borrow  £240,000. 
Of  this  sum  £100,000  was  to  be  used  to  redeem  the  paper 

*  Wythe  was  poisoned  by  a  great-nephew  who  expected  to 
come  in  as  heir.  Nowadays  the  Wythe  house,  facing  "  Palace 
Green,"  is  "  haunted."  Wythe  returns  because  he  is  distrait — 
unconvinced  of  the  regularity  of  the  final  proceedings  in  his 
case. 

82 


THE  ORATOR  OF  NATURE 

money  issued  during  the  French  War,  and  ^140,000  was 
to  be  loaned.    Jefferson  says : 

"  The  gentlemen  of  this  country  had,  at  that  time,  become 
deeply  involved  in  that  state  of  indebtment  which  has  since 
ended  in  so  general  a  crush  of  their  fortunes.  Mr.  Robinson, 
the  Speaker,  was  also  the  Treasurer,  an  officer  always  chosen 
by  the  Assembly.  He  was  an  excellent  man,  liberal,  friendly, 
and  rich.  He  had  been  drawn  in  to  lend,  on  his  own  account, 
great  sums  of  money  to  persons  of  this  description,  and  es 
pecially  those  who  were  of  the  Assembly.  He  used  freely  for 
this  purpose  the  public  money,  confiding  for  its  replacement  in 
his  own  means,  and  the  securities  he  had  taken  on  those 
loans.  About  this  time,  however,  he  became  sensible  that  his 
deficit  to  the  public  was  become  so  enormous  as  that  a  discovery 
must  soon  take  place,  for  as  yet  the  public  had  no  suspicion 
of  it.  He  devised,  therefore,  with  his  friends  in  the  Assembly, 
a  plan  for  a  public  loan  office,  to  a  certain  amount,  from  which 
money  might  be  lent  on  public  account,  and  on  good  landed 
security,  to  individuals.  I  find  in  Royle's  Virginia  Gazette,  of 
May  7,  1765,  this  proposition  for  a  loan  office  presented,  its 
advantages  detailed,  and  the  plan  explained.  It  seems  to  have 
been  done  by  a  borrowing  member,  from  the  feeling  with 
which  the  motives  are  expressed,  and  to  have  been  preparatory 
to  the  intended  motion.  The  motion  for  a  loan  office  was 
accordingly  brought  forward  in  the  House  of  Burgesses,  and  had 
it  succeeded,  the  debts  due  to  Robinson  on  these  loans  would 
have  been  transferred  to  the  public,  and  his  deficit  thus  com 
pletely  covered.  This  state  of  things,  however,  was  not  yet 
known ;  but  Mr.  Henry  attacked  the  scheme  on  other  general 
grounds,  in  that  style  of  bold,  grand,  and  overwhelming  elo 
quence  for  which  he  became  so  justly  celebrated  afterwards.  I 
had  been  intimate  with  him  from  the  year  1750-60,  and  felt 
an  interest  in  what  concerned  him ;  and  I  can  never  forget 
a  particular  exclamation  of  his  in  the  debate,  which  electrified 
his  hearers.  It  had  been  urged  that,  from  certain  unhappy 
circumstances  of  the  colony,  men  of  substantial  property  had 
contracted  debts,  which,  if  exacted  suddenly,  must  ruin  them 
and  their  families,  but  with  a  little  indulgence  of  time  might 
be  paid  with  ease.  '  What,  sir,'  exclaimed  Mr.  Henry,  in 
animadverting  on  this,  '  is  it  proposed  then  to  reclaim  the 
spendthrift  from  his  dissipation  and  extravagance  by  filling  his 
pockets  with  money?'  These  expressions  are  indelibly  im 
pressed  on  my  memory.  He  laid  open  with  so  much  energy 

83 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

the  spirit  of  favoritism  on  which  the  proposition  was  founded, 
and  the  abuses  to  which  it  would  lead,  that  it  was  crushed 
in  its  birth.  He  carried  with  him  all  the  members  of  the 
upper  counties,  and  left  a  minority  composed  merely  of  the 
aristocracy  of  the  country.  From  this  time  his  popularity 
swelled  apace ;  and  Mr.  Robinson  dying  the  year  afterward,  his 
deficit  was  brought  to  light,  and  discovered  the  true  object 
of  the  proposition." 


Thus,  within  three  days  after  his  induction  into  this 
notable  body,  Henry  had  made  his  presence  felt.  By 
his  common-sense,  by  his  instinctive  championship  of 
the  people,  and  by  his  power  as  a  speaker,  he  had  won. to 
his  side  many  members  from  the  newer  counties,  and 
had  drawn  upon  himself  the  admiring-,  if  critical, 
glances  of  the  great  "  Tuckahoes."  But  Jefferson  is 
in  error  on  one  point.  It  is  not  a  matter  of  record 
that  Henry  defeated  the  loan  office  plan  in  the  House  of 
Burgesses.  The  measure  was  carried  through  that  body 
by  Robinson's  adherents,  only  to  be  speedily  disapproved 
by  the  Council.  The  most  important  outcome  of  the 
matter  was  that  it  gave  Henry  all  the  footing  he 
needed  for  a  straightaway  advance  in  a  controversy 
which  now  disturbed  the  thinking  men  of  the  entire 
continent. 

We  here  come  to  a  story  that  is  dry  or  dramatic — 
that  palls  upon  us  or  thrills  us — according  to  the  way  in 
which  we  permit  ourselves  to  consider  it.  Dry,  indeed, 
it  is  if  we  go  at  this  oft-told  Stamp  Act  story  and 
merely  rehearse  the  customary  names,  dates,  and  facts, 
without  regard  to  the  human  element  beneath  them. 
But  if  we  betake  ourselves  to  England,  and  look  at  the 
troubled  world  awhile  through  the  eyes  of  the  young 
King,  the  old  quarrel  becomes  new,  and  all  its  comedies 
and  tragedies  take  on  the  human  savor.  Therefore,  let 
us  bring  forward  some  of  the  persons  and  personages 
of  the  play — the  historical  drama  of  King  George  III. 

84 


THE  ORATOR  OF  NATURE 

The  argument  drops  into  the  present  tense,  after  the 
good  old  fashion  of  such  abstracts,  and  runs : 

At  Cliveden  a  rain-shower  breaks  up  a  cricket-game 
and  Frederick,  the  heir-apparent,  is  driven  indoors. 
Whist  would  relieve  the  ennui  of  his  Royal  Highness, 
but  that  some  one  is  needed  to  make  up  a  rubber. 
At  the  side  of  the  family  doctor,  in  a  gig,  sits  an  un 
known  nobleman.  The  stranger  is  asked  to  take  a  hand. 
He  is  tall,  charming,  a  fine  talker.  His  legs,  especially, 
are  "  the  theme  of  general  admiration  "  among  the  court 
ladies.  At  once  he  wins  Prince,  Princess,  and  the  young 
Prince.  He  is  John  Stuart,  Earl  of  Bute — soon  to  be 
known  far  and  wide  as  "  the  Scotch  favorite."  When 
Frederick  dies,  Bute  becomes  nearer  than  ever  to  the 
Princess  Dowager — nearer  and  dearer.  The  scandal 
mongers  notice  it,  but  the  scandalmongers  themselves  are 
not  worthy  of  notice.  Bute  reads  the  manuscript  of 
Blackstone  to  the  young  Prince,  and  points  out  for  him 
the  beauties  of  Bolingbroke's  "  Patriot  King."  "  George, 
be  King !  "  says  the  Princess  Dowager ;  and  Bute  echoes, 
"  George,  be  King !  "  By  and  by  the  old  German  grand 
father  dies,  and  George  III.  comes  to  the  crown.  Sure 
enough,  the  old  days  are  over.  Whiggery  is  spent  and 
done.  No  more  shall  ministers  rule.  In  evidence  of  his 
kingliness,  George  gives  up  his  sweetheart.  He  loves 
Lady  Sarah  Lennox,  but  sacrifices  himself  and  her,  and 
weds  Sophia.  He  means  to  lead  a  pure  life,  a  strong 
life.  "George,  be  King!"  is  not  simply  a  pious  motto, 
but  expresses  now  his  master-passion.  To  him  a  consti 
tutional  monarch  is  "  a  monarch  in  fetters."  All  hail 
Myself ! 

So  far  your  playwright  skims,  alert  for  material  out 
of  which  to  construct  his  drama.  Then  he  pauses  long. 
He  has  come  upon  an  incident  that  is  full  of  meaning. 
Around  it  he  writes  his  first  scene.  It  is  not  where  the 
peruke-makers  visit  the  King  and  beg  him,  in  the  name 

85 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

of  bread-and-butter,  to  wear  a  wig;  it  is  not  where  the 
hatters  come  bowing  and  scraping,  with  their  hats  off — 
these  incidents  but  lend  themselves  to  comedy.  It  is  not 
even  a  matter  connected  with  the  exasperating  Wilkes 
case.  True,  his  Majesty  wants  to  be  King  to  the  Lon 
don  peruke-makers  and  hatters,  as  well  as  to  the  bear- 
hunters  on  the  distant  Ohio;  but  the  tragedy  does  not 
begin  with  perukes  and  hats  and  bearskins ;  nor  yet  with 
Wilkes,  who  is  vastly  more  trouble  in  jail  than  out.  It 
begins  when  King  George  turns  his  back  on  William  Pitt, 
the  competent  man,  and  puts  power  into  the  hands  of 
Bute,  the  incompetent.  Pitt  is  "  the  Great  Commoner  " — 
the  organizer  of  victory.  He  is  of  lofty  spirit.  He  is  well- 
grounded  in  the  British  Constitution.  Before  the  gout 
goes  from  his  feet  to  his  head,  he  is  wise,  safe,  far- 
sighted — a  well-tried,  a  triumphant,  a  powerful  minister. 
Where  on  this  rolling  planet  is  there  an  empire-builder 
comparable  with  Pitt  ?  Bute  is  so  "  slow  and  pompous  " 
in  speech  that  the  wags  call  him  "  the  Parliamentary 
minute-gun."  He  is  "  the  obstinate  minister  of  an 
obstinate  King."  But  "  Lord  Bute  is  my  very  good 
friend,"  says  his  Majesty.  It  is  "  the  era  of  the  King's 
friends."  Pitt's  brother-in-law,  George  Grenville,  is 
one  of  these — also  an  incompetent.  He  "  moves  in  a 
world  of  formulas  and  abstractions."  He  knows  figures, 
but  not  men.  Few  of  the  King's  friends  know  human 
nature,  indeed. 

Nor  have  they  an  imperial  horizon.  This  is  shown 
by  their  myopic  view  of  America.  Equable  and  even 
magnanimous  in  the  treatment  of  her  distant  colonies, 
Nineteenth  Century  England  would  rarely  slip  from  her 
high  plane  of  imperial  conduct ;  but  Eighteenth  Century 
England  regards  her  raw  regions  over  sea  with  mono 
polistic  eye.  She  restricts  their  trade  as  she  pleases,  and 
exploits  them.  She  tells  them  what  they  may  make  and 
what  not  make.  She  defines  their  markets.  She  selects 

86 


THE  ORATOR  OF  NATURE 

the  tallest  trees  in  the  free  wilderness  for  royal  spars, 
and  the  colonist  must  stay  his  axe.  She  is  begged  to 
stop  the  slave  trade,  but  refuses  to  do  so  because  the 
crown  profits  thereby.  Of  course,  the  welfare  of  America 
is  a  consideration  with  King  and  Parliament,  but  often 
it  is  a  secondary  consideration.  At  bottom  the  policy  is 
commercial.  It  is  selfish.  London  is  the  centre  of 
things,  and  London  is  to  be  fed  with  the  world's  best 
blood.  Help  the  extremities  of  the  empire  if  possible, 
but  feed  and  enrich  England  at  all  events — King,  court 
favorites,  the  commercial  lords  of  the  realm.  People 
living  on  the  outer  edge  of  the  world  should  not  expect 
too  much.  They  have  their  churches,  and  so  may  get 
to  heaven — that  ought  to  be  enough. 

In  living  up  to  the  motto,  "  George,  be  King,"  his 
Majesty  not  only  dismisses  his  sweetheart  and  his  great 
minister,  but  determines  to  enforce  a  certain  obsolete 
colonial  law.  Bute's  Lansdowne  House  has  become  a 
royal  music-hall,  and  there,  while  the  fiddles  play,  King 
George  and  the  Scotch  earl  fill  each  other's  ears  with  the 
words  u  America,"  "  Boston,"  "  smuggling,"  and  the 
like.  Why  make  trade  laws  for  the  benefit  of  the  British 
West  Indies  and  permit  New  Englanders  to  nullify 
them?  Were  not  crown  officers  in  collusion  with  the 
smugglers?  Was  there  not  utter  demoralization  in  that 
quarter  ?  Humph !  The  illicit  trade  must  stop.  Since 
the  law  is  a  dead-letter,  it  shall  have  the  royal  breath 
breathed  into  it,  and  then  it  will  be  alive. 

Worse  still,  the  sturdy  English  people  have  somehow 
got  it  into  their  heads  that  it  is  right  to  tax  the  Ameri 
cans.  Why  not  ?  Of  the  one  hundred  and  forty  millions 
just  added  to  the  debt,  sixty  millions  have  been  spent 
in  driving  the  French  off  the  American  Continent. 
Whigs  there  are  with  better  instincts  in  this  matter  of 
arbitrary  taxation.  Pitt  sees  clearly  that  each  colony 
"  has  its  own  parliament " ;  but  the  King  does  not  wish 

87 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

it  to  be  so,  and  will  not  admit  that  it  is  so.  "  An  English 
man,"  protests  Burke,  "  is  the  unfittest  person  on  earth 
to  argue  another  Englishman  into  slavery."  But  the 
King  hopes  to  crush  the  Whigs,  and  he  forgets  what 
even  that  bad  man  and  bad  monarch,  Charles  II.,  was 
pleased  to  remember  and  give  assurance  of :  "  Taxes 
ought  not  to  be  laid  on  the  inhabitants  and  proprietors 
of  the  colonies  but  by  the  consent  of  the  General  As 
sembly."  He  forgets  Sir  Robert  Walpole's  exclamation 
when  advised  to  do  the  thing  now  about  to  be  done: 
"What!  I  have  old  England  against  me;  and  do  you 
think  I  will  have  New  England  likewise?  "  He  fails  to 
see  that,  being  rid  of  the  French,  the  colonists  will  no 
longer  need  the  British ;  and  that  they  have  weighed  the 
redcoat  and  found  him  wanting  in  forest  warfare. 
George  III.,  indeed,  forgets  or  ignores  many  facts — 
that  the  colonists  put  25,000  men  into  the  field ;  that  they 
incurred  a  war  debt  of  their,  own  of  two  and  a  half 
millions ;  that  they  are  already  stripped  to  the  shirt  by 
taxes ;  that  their  trade  is  onerously  fettered  by  navigation 
laws  made  in  the  interest  of  England;  that  the  bloody 
Indian  menace  is  constantly  upon  their  border ;  that  to 
lay  them  open  to  any  tax  at  any  time  by  any  Parliament 
would  be  to  depreciate  all  values  among  them,  and  turn 
freemen  into  a  subject  people.  "  Zounds !  "  says  Squire 
Western ;  "  I  won't  ha'  ut.  Ain't  she  my  daughter  ? 
She  shall  marry  'um  !  "  "  Zounds  !  "  says  England, 
drowning  the  voices  of  such  men  as  Barre  and  Burke  ; 
"  ain't  she  my  daughter  ?  She  shall  pay  'um !  " 

There  is  ample  popular  backing,  so  the  King,  who 
develops  "  an  extraordinary  propensity  for  seeing  only 
the  wrong  side  of  a  case,"  causes  Grenville  to  devise 
a  colonial  plan.  Grenville's  idea  is  to  quarter  20,000 
soldiers  in  America,  and  to  raise  £300,000  a  year 
there  for  their  support.  Accordingly,  he  elaborates 
a  Stamp  Act,  with  fifty-four  sections.  The  stamps  are 

88 


THE  ORATOR  OF  NATURE 

to  vary  in  value  from  half  a  penny  to  £10,  and  are  to 
be  affixed  or  impressed  upon  deeds,  wills,  clearance 
papers,  newspapers,  almanacs,  and  the  like.  Grenville 
talks  to  his  Majesty  volubly — tediously.  He  tries  to  get 
the  King  in  his  power;  and  the  King,  for  his  part,  is 
trying  to  get  his  kingdom  underfoot.  The  King  also 
talks  a  great  deal — so  fast  that  people  cannot  understand 
him.  He  certainly  is  not  a  great,  or  even  sagacious,  man. 
His  mind  is  not  as  expansive  as  his  now  wonderful 
realm.  Indeed,  in  the  language  of  the  English  historian 
Green,  here  is  a  ruler  with  "  a  smaller  mind  than  any 
English  King  before  him  since  James  II."  But,  as  the 
grim  stage-poet  sees,  George  III.  figures  well  in  scenes 
that  make  for  tragedy.  Something  frightful  haunts 
him.  He  is  often  cupped,  but  cupping  does  not  cure. 
The  mixture  of  hatters  and  peruke-makers  and  mad 
hares  crying,  "  George,  be  King !  "  is  too  much  for  an 
honest,  well-meaning  gentleman  who  has  fallen  into 
the  error  of  thinking  himself  more  than  a  man. 

At  this  point  we  may  quit  England  and  those  who  had 
to  do  with  the  genesis  of  the  taxation  storm,  and  come 
again  to  Virginia.  On  the  way  back,  it  is  fit  that  we 
should  tarry  in  Boston  long  enough  to  bring  James  Otis 
and  the  contest  of  1761  sharply  to  mind.  Laws  that 
interrupt  the  natural  flow  of  trade  are  in  contempt  of 
human  reason ;  hence  they  breed  lawbreakers.  England 
herself  then  harbored  some  40,000  smugglers — Tom 
Paine,  imagine  it!  being  an  exciseman;  and  New  Eng 
land  certainly  sheltered  great  numbers  of  them.  The 
New  Englanders  sailed  a  thousand  vessels  in  their 
fisheries  and  half  a  thousand  in  their  over-sea  trade. 
It  suited  them  to  court  prosperity  by  evading  navigation 
laws  that  had  become  practically  obsolete.  But 
George  III.  attempted  to  enforce  these  laws.  Armed 
with  "  Writs  of  Assistance,"  his  officers  entered  any 
house  they  pleased — thus  brutalizing  life  and  making  a 

89 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

mockery  of  freedom.  This  it  was  that  gave  the  eloquent 
Otis  his  theme  when  he  appeared  as  the  champion  of 
the  people  in  the  Town  Hall,  Boston,  before  a  bench  of 
bewigged  justices  in  scarlet  cloth,  and  spoke  to  the  text, 
"  A  man's  house  is  his  castle."  "  A  flaming  patriot," 
Governor  Hutchinson  called  him.  "  Then  and  there/' 
said  John  Adams,  "  the  child  Independence  was  born." 
In  a  word,  Otis  was  to  the  Northern  colonies  what 
Patrick  Henry  was  to  the  Southern;  but,  as  Wells,  in 
his  "  Life  of  Samuel  Adams,"  reminds  us,  "  the  argu 
ment  of  Otis  was  not  the  prologue  of  the  great  drama, 
for  it  did  not  then  begin.  The  American  Revolution  was 
>L.  caused  by,  and  opened  with,  the  revenue  acts.  The  direct 
issue  was  the  raising  of  a  revenue  from  the  colonies 
without  their  consent,  and  without  their  being  repre 
sented  in  Parliament." 

When  news  reached  America  that  the  Grenville  Stamp 
Act  was  indeed  a  law,  and  would  go  into  effect  on  All 
Saints'  Day,  November  I,  1765,  the  various  colonies  pre 
pared  to  execute  it.  Even  Otis  said :  "  It  is  the  duty  of 
all  humbly  and  silently  to  acquiesce  in  all  the  decisions 
of  the  supreme  legislature."  In  not  one  of  the  colonies 
was  there  a  definite  purpose  to  resist  the  imposition  of 
the  tax.  The  tone  throughout  was  that  of  remonstrance. 
Despondency  was  everywhere. 

There  were  many  remonstrants,  even  supplicants,. in 
the  Old  Dominion.  In  recounting  the  colonial  glories  of 
the  Williamsburg  Peninsula,  enough  was  said  to  indicate 
that  Virginia  had  long  sought  to  incorporate  in  its  polity 
the  spirit  and  guarantees  of  manhood's  rights.  There 
was  in  the  colony  a  powerful  body  of  opinion,  and  its 
spokesmen  were  such  conservatives  as  Richard  Bland, 
Peyton  Randolph,  Edmund  Pendleton,  George  Wythe, 
and  Richard  Henry  Lee.  But  they  were  so  habituated 
to  acquiescence  in  matters  affecting  loyalty  that  it  did 
not  occur  to  them  to  do  other  than  curb  their  tongues, 

90 


THE  ORATOR  OF  NATURE 

talk  in  whispers  when  criticising  his  Majesty,  and  write 
guardedly  when  sending  their  protests  to  the  London 
government.  In  fact,  Richard  Henry  Lee  was  willing 
to  take  office  under  the  Stamp  law.  A  committee 
of  the  House  of  Burgesses  had  forwarded  an  address 
"  to  the  King's  most  excellent  Majesty,"  a  memorial 
"  to  the  Right  Honourable  the  Lords  Spiritual  and 
Temporal,"  and  a  remonstrance  to  the  House  of  Com 
mons.  The  tone  of  the  first  two  was  suppliant — dutiful, 
conciliatory ;  but  the  remonstrance  to  the  Commons  had 
a  high  spirit  of  manliness.  It  was  written  by  Wythe ; 
and  we  find  a  measure  of  how  matters  stood  prior  to 
Henry's  appearance  upon  the  scene,  in  the  fact  that 
Wythe's  conscience  troubled  him  lest  he  had  written 
some  passage  that  might  be  construed  as  treasonable. 
He  did  not  mean  to  draw  down  upon  himself  the  appli 
cation  of  such  a  horrid  word.  Among  the  great 
*'  Tuckahoes  "  there  was  much  indignation  against  King 
and  Parliament ;  but  every  man  of  high  influence  shrank 
from  the  odium  that  seemed  sure  to  follow  the  cry 
"  Resist !  " 

It  was  Henry  who  spoke  the  word — who  raised  the 
cry.  i 

The  "  Old  Capitol,"  where  he  made  his  Stamp  Act 
speech,  is  gone.  The  visitor  to  the  spot  sees  an  open 
square  at  the  town's  end.  Round  about  are  old-fashioned 
buildings  shaded  by  sycamores,  "  honeyshuck "  trees, 
and  beautiful  crape-myrtles.  In  the  centre  of  the  square 
the  foundation  walls  are  traced  in  masonry.  The  effect  is 
as  if  a  huge  "  H  "  had  been  marked  out  upon  the  grass, 
which  one  knows  to  be  sheep-mint  because  of  the  balmy 
smell  in  the  air  when  it  is  bruised  with  the  foot.  The  bar 
of  the  "  H  "  stands  for  a  broad  passage  that  connected 
the  main  parts  of  the  two-story  brick  edifice.  The  hall 
of  the  House  of  Burgesses  was  on  the  ground  floor  in 
the  western  half,  and  the  Council  Chamber  was  above. 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

An  old  print  pictures  for  us  a  front  with  many  windows 
and  a  tall  portico.*  Such  was  the  "  Heart  of  the  Revo 
lution  "  in  Virginia. 

Henry  might  well  be  imagined  as  standing  with  his 
half-brother,  Burgess  John  Syme,  among  the  "  Qo'hees  " 
at  this  porticoed  entrance  on  the  morning  of  the  2Qth 
•y^of  May — his  29th  birthday.  Let  us  remember  that  there 
were  two  grand  divisions  of  men  in  Virginia — our  aris 
tocratic  friends,  the  "  Tuckahoes,"  from  the  thirty-five 
counties  on  tidewater,  and  the  "  Oo'hees,"  in  buck 
skin  breeches,  from  the  twenty-one  upper  counties,  f  But 
locally,  in  Stamp  Act  times,  there  was  another  way  of 
distinguishing  the  parties :  the  King's  people  were  called 
"  Old  Field  Nags,"  and  those  of  whom  Henry  was  about 
to  take  the  lead  were  known  as  "  High-blooded  Colts." 
In  the  main,  these  latter  were  young  men — brave  bor- 


*  "  In  shape,"  says  John  Esten  Cooke,  "  the  Old  Capitol  re 
sembled  an  '  H ' — a  covered  gallery  30  feet  in  length,  sur 
mounted  by  a  cupola  and  clock,  connecting  the  two  wings. 
The  fronts  on  each  side  were  approached  through  lofty  porti 
coes,  with  iron  balconies  above;  and  double  doors,  each  six 
feet  wide,  gave  access  to  the  hall  and  the  corresponding  room 
on  the  other  side,  which  was  that  of  the  General  Court. 
The  hall  was  50  feet  long  and  25  feet  wide,  with  a  floor  of 
flagstones."  The  building  was  burned  in  April,  1832. 

f  Edward  W.  James,  of  Norfolk,  whose  antiquarian  studies 
have  led  him  to  examine  many  inventories,  warns  the  writer 
of  this  book  against  the  fallacy  that  the  Virginians  were 
divided  into  "  the  very  rich  and  very  poor."  Most  of  them  were 
neither  the  one  nor  the  other.  In  like  manner,  Dr.  Lyon  G. 
Tyler  warns  him  against  the  pitfall  of  a  magnified  colonial 
aristocracy.  He  says :  "  The  democratic  spirit  was  progressive, 
and  long  antecedent  to  the  American  Revolution.  .  .  .  Pat 
rick  Henry  would  never  have  written  his  resolutions  on  the 
Stamp  Act,  nor  Mason  his  celebrated  Bill  of  Rights,  unless 
they  had  been  bred  among  a  people  accustomed  to  liberty. 
.  .  .  Dinwiddie  and  Spotswood  fully  admitted,  years  before, 
the  free  spirit  of  the  Virginians." 

92 


THE  ORATOR  OF  NATURE 

derers — poor,  pushing,  and  perhaps  impatient  of  the  par 
liamentary  restraints  put  upon  them  by  custom;  for,  as 
Rives  remarks,  "  the  House  of  Burgesses  was  organized 
with  a  scrupulous  observance  of  all  the  stereotyped  regal 
formalities."  One  of  the  "  Qo'hees,"  having  uttered  an 
oath  in  debate,  was  made  to  stand  while  the  Speaker 
reprimanded  him  in  due  form  and  with  impressive 
solemnity ;  and,  as  it  is  further  related,  at  the  end  of  the 
proceeding  the  culprit  set  up  a  devil-may-care  whistle, 
whereat  the  whole  House  laughed.  King  George  may 
have  been  sovereign  lord  and  master  among  the  peruke- 
makers  of  London,  but  he  was  not  so  regarded  by  the 
free-footed  "  buckskins  "  who  knew  the  color  of  the 
mountains,  and  who  yearned  to  cross  them,  passing 
West. 

Since  the  session  was  drawing  to  a  close,  many 
members  had  left  town;  therefore  the  House  was  slim.V- 
Governor  Fauquier  says  that  but  thirty-nine  were 
present.  We  may,  if  we  please,  enter  the  hall,  preempt 
a  vacant  seat,  and  use  our  eyes  and  ears.  We  shall  see 
that  Speaker  Robinson,  still  hiding  his  private  ruin  under 
public  show,  sat  in  dignity  upon  a  dais.  A  gilded  rod 
upheld  a  red  canopy  above  him.  In  front  and  below 
was  a  table,  by  which  sat  the  clerk,  and  upon  which 
rested  a  silver  mace.  Some  of  the  Burgesses  were  in 
velvet  dress,  with  ruffles  and  powdered  hair,  others  in 
rough  cloth  and  buckskin. 

And  now  for  action.  Henry's  helper,  George  Johnston, 
of  Fairfax — lawyer,  scholar,  man  of  character,  and 
champion  of  liberty — took  the  floor.  He  moved  that  the 
House  go  into  Committee  of  the  Whole  to  consider  the 
Stamp  Act.  Henry  seconded  the  motion,  which  was 
carried ;  the  clerk  put  the  mace  under  the  table ;  Robin 
son  gave  way  as  presiding  officer  to  Attorney-General 
Peyton  Randolph ;  and  the  Burgesses  were  in  Commit 
tee  of  the  Whole.  Thereupon  Henry  introduced  a 

93 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

series  of  resolutions — some  say  six,  some  say  seven — 
which  he  had  written  on  the  blank  leaf  of  an  old  copy 
of  "  Coke  upon  Littleton/'  Thanks  to  Henry  himself, 
we  are  certain  as  to  the  exact  wording  of  the  first  five, 
which,  with  their  preamble,  ran  as  follows : 


"  Whereas,  The  honorable  House  of  Commons  in  England 
have  of  late  drawn  into  question  how  far  the  General  Assembly 
of  this  Colony  hath  power  to  enact  laws  for  laying  of  taxes 
and  imposing  duties,  payable  by  the  people  of  this  his  Majesty's 
most  ancient  colony:  for  settling  and  ascertaining  the  same 
to  all  future  times,  the  House  of  Burgesses  of  this  present 
General  Assembly  have  come  to  the  following  resolves : 

"  Resolved,  That  the  first  adventurers  and  settlers  of  this 
his  Majesty's  colony  and  dominion  brought  with  them,  and 
transmitted  to  their  posterity,  and  all  other  his  Majesty's  sub 
jects  since  inhabiting  in  this  his  Majesty's  said  colony,  all  the 
privileges,  franchises,  and  immunities  that  have  at  any  time 
been  held,  enjoyed,  and  possessed  by  the  people  of  Great 
Britain. 

"Resolved,  That  by  two  royal  charters,  granted  by  King 
James  the  First,  the  colonists  aforesaid  are  declared  entitled 
to  all  the  privileges,  liberties,  and  immunities  of  denizens  and 
natural-born  subjects,  to  all  intents  and  purposes  as  if  they 
had  been  abiding  and  born  within  the  realm  of  England. 

"  Resolved,  That  the  taxation  of  the  people  by  themselves, 
or  by  persons  chosen  by  themselves  to  represent  them,  who 
can  only  know  what  taxes  the  people  are  able  to  bear,  and  the 
easiest  mode  of  raising  them,  and  are  equally  affected  by 
such  taxes  themselves,  is  the  distinguishing  characteristick  of 
British  freedom,  and  without  which  the  ancient  Constitution 
cannot  exist. 

"Resolved,  That  his  Majesty's  liege  people  of  this  most 
ancient  colony  have  uninterruptedly  enjoyed  the  right  of 
being  thus  governed  by  their  own  Assembly  in  the  article  of 
their  taxes  and  internal  police,  and  that  the  same  hath  never 
been  forfeited  or  any  other  way  given  up,  but  hath  been  con 
stantly  recognized  by  the  Kings  and  people  of  Great  Britain. 

"Resolved,  therefore,  That  the  General  Assembly  of  this 
colony  have  the  only  and  sole  exclusive  right  and  power  to 
lay  taxes  and  impositions  upon  the  inhabitants  of  this  colony, 
and  that  every  attempt  to  vest  such  power  in  any  person  or 

94 


HENRY    IN   THE    HOUSE   OF    BURGESSES 

(P.  H.  Rothermel's  idealization  of  the  scene  when  the  orator  provoked  protesting 
cries  of  "  Treason  !    Treason!") 


THE  ORATOR  OF  NATURE 

persons  whatsoever,  other  than  the  General  Assembly  aforesaid, 
has  a  manifest  tendency  to  destroy  British  as  well  as  Ameri 
can  freedom." 

At  once  the  Burgesses  became  open-eyed;  then  ani 
mated;  then  excited.  Phrased  in  language  peculiar  to 
such  documents  of  state,  the  resolutions  nevertheless 
were  essentially  freighted  with  patriotic  meaning.  Here 
was  something  strong — something  dangerous,  indeed, 
something  that  might  attaint.  Here,  practically,  was 
defiance  of  a  great  power. 

Soon  the  air  was  so  surcharged  as  to  possess  that 
galvanic  quality  which  sets  the  blood  going  and  quickens 
all  the  senses.  Cautious  tongues  lost  their  bridle.  There 
was  plain  speaking — there  was  no  lack  of  vehemence. 
Quick  to  grasp  the  grave  purport  of  the  matter  thus 
thrown  into  the  proceedings  of  a  body  they  were  accus 
tomed  to  control,  the  older  Burgesses  drew  together 
in  opposition ;  the  more  daring  members  supported  and 
applauded  the  newly  risen  leader.  But  though  George 
Johnston,  of  Fairfax,  Robert  Munford,  of  Mecklenburg, 
and  John  Fleming,  of  Cumberland,  spoke  in  favor  of  the 
resolutions,  Henry  was  the  mainstay  in  their  defence  and 
the  driving  power  in  their  advocacy.  Men  like  Wythe 
and  Peyton  Randolph  "  saw  at  once,"  says  Howison, 
"  the  broad  line  between  their  feeble  memorials  and  these 
nervous  and  manly  protests.  They  felt  that  the  last 
resolution,  in  particular,  arraigned  the  English  legis 
lature,  King,  Lords,  and  Commons,  before  them,  and 
boldly  charged  them  with  despotism  and  tyranny.  But 
Henry  was  equal  to  the  task  he  had  assumed.  Now  at 
length  he  had  a  theme  worthy  of  himself — not  confined 
by  technical  rules  or  provincial  limits,  but  broad  as  the 
British  empire,  affecting  the  rights  of  mankind,  and 
appealing  at  once  to  the  highest  powers  of  the  intellect 
and  the  warmest  feelings  of  the  heart.  He  rejoiced  in 
his  subject,  and,  grasping  it  like  a  giant,  he  expanded 

95 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

it  before  his  astonished  hearers,  until  its  sublimity  began 
to  force  itself  upon  them.  His  words  were  pregnant 
with  a  nation's  freedom." 

Thus  far  it  is  safe  to  follow  Howison;  but  when  he 
begins  to  skeletonize  Henry's  argument,  he  cites  Burk, 
whose  account  has  been  questioned.  Wirt  frankly 
admits  his  inability  to  reconstruct  the  argument.  So 
Howison's  further  summary  can  be  regarded  only  as  an 
echo  of  tradition.  But  here  it  is : 

"  He  [Henry]  reasoned  upon  the  chartered  rights  of  the 
colony;  he  unfolded  the  written  grants  of  English  monarchs, 
even  in  an  age  of  servitude,  and  showed  the  clauses  guaranteeing 
the  privileges  of  America.  He  explored  the  depths  of  the  Brit 
ish  Constitution,  and,  by  long-established  precedents,  proved  the 
connection  between  taxes  and  the  free  consent  of  the  people ; 
then,  leaving  charters  and  human  conventions,  he  entered  upon 
an  inquiry  into  the  natural  rights  of  man,  and  announced  doc 
trines  then  almost  unheard,  but  which  have  since  become  the 
basis  of  our  government."  * 

There  is  no  question  as  to  the  very  words  used  in 
Henry's  flaming  climax.  "  I  attended  the  debate  at  the 
door  of  the  lobby  of  the  House  of  Burgesses,"  writes 
Thomas  Jefferson,  in  his  "  Autobiography  " — he  was 
still  a  student — "  and  heard  the  splendid  display  of  Mr. 
Henry's  talents  as  a  popular  orator.  They  were  great 
indeed ;  such  as  I  have  never  heard  from  any  other  man. 
He  appeared  to  me  to  speak  as  Homer  wrote."  Again, 
in  his  letter  to  Wirt,  Jefferson  says : 

*John  Burk,  "an  ardent,  sanguine,  and  bold  genius,"  puts 
two  eloquent  passages  into  Henry's  mouth  on  this  theme  of 
rights  "  derived  from  the  God  of  nature,"  but  where  he  got 
them,  if  not  out  of  his  own  excellent  imagination,  no  one  knows. 
Nevertheless,  it  should  be  remembered  that  Burk  probably 
talked  with  men  who  had  heard  Henry  make  this  great  Stamp 
Act  speech.  Burk,  killed  in  a  duel,  had  no  opportunity  to  sub 
stantiate  his  assertions. 

96 


THE  ORATOR  OF  NATURE 

"  Mr.  Henry  moved  and  Mr.  Johnston  seconded  these  resolu 
tions  successively.  They  were  opposed  by  Messrs.  Randolph, 
Bland,  Pendleton,  Wythe,  and  all  the  old  members,  whose  influ 
ence  in  the  House  had,  till  then,  been  unbroken.  They  did  it, 
not  from  any  question  of  our  rights,  but  on  the  ground  that 
the  same  sentiments  had  been,  at  their  preceding  session,  ex 
pressed  in  a  more  conciliatory  form,  to  which  the  answers  were 
not  yet  received.  But  torrents  of  sublime  eloquence  from 
Henry,  backed  by  the  solid  reasoning  of  Johnston,  prevailed. 
The.  last,  however,  and  strongest  resolution  was  carried  by  but 
a  single  vote.  The  debate  on  it  was  most  bloody." 

How  much  of  the  battle  took  place  on  the  29th  and 
how  much  on  the  3Oth  is  unknown.  The  written  journal 
is  missing.  The  printed  journal  says  that  when,  on  the 
29th,  the  Committee  reported  the  resolutions,  it  was 
ordered  that  the  report  be  received  on  the  morrow.  On 
the  3Oth,  the  five  resolutions  were  thrice  read  in  the 
House,  and  the  fierce  contest  was  resumed. 

'Now,  such  is  our  familiarity  with  Henry's  telling 
passages  while  speaking  on  the  fifth  resolution,  that  at 
this  day  they  fail  to  stir  us  as  they  stirred  young  Jeffer 
son  and  stirred  all  who  heard  them  ,in  the  heat  and  glory 
of  that  "  most  bloody  "  debate.  ^  Just  as  parody  has 
strumpeted  the  beauty  of  many  Shakespearean  figures, 
so  the  mouth  of  boy  and  man  has  practised  upon  these 
passages  until  it  is  difficult  to  make  them  seem  other  than 
a  commonplace  of  elocution.  \  Yet  Judge  Paul  Carring- 
ton  declares  that  Henry's  eloquence  was  "  beyond  all 
power  of  description  " ;  and  others  present  testify  that 
the  outburst  came  as  a  fit  and  glorious  climax  to  the 
long  forensic  struggle  that  gave  the  Revolution  its  initial 
impulse.  In  a  voice  and  with  a  manner  that  startled 
those  even  who  were  aware  of  his  virile  nature  and 
masterful  tongue,  Henry  said : 

"  Tarquin  and  Caesar  had  each  his  Brutus,  Charles 
the  First  his  Cromwell,  and  George  the  Third — "  He 
paused. 

7  97 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

"  Treason !  "  came  in  a  shout  from  the  Speaker,  high 
on  his  dais.  "  Treason !  Treason !  "  cried  many  Bur 
gesses. 

Then,  in  no  haste,  but  with  impressive  access  of 
dignity — growing  visibly  taller,  until  he  seemed  the  very 
embodiment  of  resolute  manhood — he  spoke  his  final 
words : 

" may  profit  by  their  example !  If  this  be  treason, 

make  the  most  of  it." 

It  was,  indeed,  "  a  warning  flash  from  history." 
Neither  young  Jefferson  nor  young  John  Tyler,  who 
stood  side  by  side  in  the  lobby,  needed  to  put  upon  paper, 
for  memory's  sake,  such  words  as  these.  Tyler's  mental 
picture  of  the  scene  long  remained  most  vivid.  Jefferson 
stood  at  the  door  of  communication  between  the  House 
and  the  lobby  during  the  whole  debate  and  vote,  which 
was  twenty-two  for  and  seventeen  against  the  resolu 
tions.  The  vote  on  the  fifth  resolution  was  twenty  to 
nineteen.  Jefferson  says : 

"  I  well  remember  that,  after  the  members  on  the  division 
were  told  and  declared  from  the  chair,  Peyton  Randolph  (the 
Attorney-General)  came  out  at  the  door  where  I  was  standing, 
and  said,  as  he  entered  the  lobby :  '  By  God,  I  would  have  given 
500  guineas  for  a  single  vote ; '  for  one  would  have  divided  the 
House,  and  Robinson  was  in  the  chair,  who  he  knew  would  have 
negatived  the  resolution.  Mr.  Henry  left  town  that  evening, 
and  the  next  morning,  before  the  meeting  of  the  House,  Colonel 
Peter  Randolph,  then  of  the  Council,  came  to  the  Hall  of  the 
Burgesses,  and  sat  at  the  clerk's  table  till  the  House-bell  rang, 
thumbing  over  the  volumes  of  journals  to  find  a  precedent  for 
expunging  a  vote  of  the  House,  which  he  said  had  taken  place 
while  he  was  a  member  or  clerk  of  the  House,  I  do  not  recollect 
which.  I  stood  by  him  at  the  end  of  the  table  a  considerable 
part  of  the  time,  looking  on,  as  he  turned  over  the  leaves,  but 
I  do  not  recollect  whether  he  found  the  erasure.  In  the  mean 
time,  some  of  the  timid  members,  who  had  voted  for  the 
strongest  resolution,  had  become  alarmed,  and  as  soon  as  the 
House  met,  a  motion  was  made  and  carried  to  expunge  it  from 
the  journal," 

98 


THE  ORATOR  OF  NATURE 

This  was  the  fifth  resolution,  which  had  been  carried 
by  a  vote  that  could  not  have  been  bought  for  five 
hundred  guineas  or  any  other  sum.  It  was  the  vote  of 
Thomas  Lewis.  There  was  many  a  romance  wrapped 
up  in  the  lives  of  the  men  on  the  floor  of  the  House 
of  Burgesses,  but  no  family  tale  would  better  fit  into  a 
novel  than  that  of  the  immigrant  Lewis,  father  of 
Thomas,  who  with  his  own  hand  slew  a  hectoring  Irish 
lord,  and,  fleeing  hither,  brought  up  his  sons  to  be  brave 
Virginia  borderers. 

Doubtless  Governor  Fauquier  would  not  have  been 
relieved  of  the  humiliating  necessity  of  forwarding  this 
fifth  resolution  to  the  Lords  of  Trade  if  Henry  had  re 
mained  in  Williamsburg  a  day  longer.  But  in  Grigsby 
we  have  a  glimpse  of  him,  immediately  after  his  victory, 
"  passing  along  the  street,  on  his  way  to  his  home  in 
Louisa,  clad  in  a  pair  of  leather  breeches,  his.  saddle 
bags  on  his  arm,  leading  a  lean  horse,  and  chatting  with 
Paul  Carrington,  who  walked  by  his  side."  * 

Mention  has  been  made  of  Henry's  habitual  disregard 
of  memoranda  concerning  himself.  But  on  this  occasion, 
being  actuated  by  the  wish  to  appear  in  a  true  light  be 
fore  his  countrymen,  he  was  at  pains  to  preserve  the 

*  P.  F.  "Rothermel's  painting,  "  Patrick  Henry  in  the  House  of 
Burgesses,  Delivering  his  Celebrated  Speech  Against  the  Stamp 
Act,"  took  the  thousand-dollar  prize  offered  in  1852  by  the  Art 
Union  of  Philadelphia.  It  did  not  escape  criticism.  The  Vir 
ginia  Historical  Register  said :  "  In  the  first  place,  the  principal 
figure,  Patrick  Henry  himself,  is  glaringly  unlike  the  original, 
or  at  least  differs  greatly  from  Sully's  portrait  of  it  ...  which 
we  take  to  be  altogether  authentic.  It  violates,  also,  all  our 
settled  notions  of  the  orator's  appearance  and  costume;  and 
instead  of  a  plain  and  unpretending  man  .  .  .  we  have  a  well 
dressed  actor  ...  in  his  fine  scarlet  cloak;  and,  then,  instead 
of  that  famous  old-fashioned  wig  which  he  actually  wore  at  the 
time,  and  perhaps  twisted  awry,  we  have  here  those  '  ambrosial 
curls,'  fashionably  powdered,  and  adjusted  with  nice  care  and 
easy  grace  about  the  brow." 

99 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

resolutions  as  adopted  by  the  House.  With  his  will  was 
found  a  sealed  letter,  thus  endorsed :  "  Inclosed  are  the 
resolutions  of  the  Virginia  Assembly,  in  1765,  concern 
ing  the  Stamp  Act.  Let  my  executors  open  this  paper." 
On  the  back  of  the  paper  containing  the  resolutions 
(already  presented)  was  the  following  statement: 

"  The  within  resolutions  passed  the  House  of  Burgesses  in 
May,  1765.  They  formed  the  first  opposition  to  the  Stamp  Act 
and  the  scheme  of  taxing  America  by  the  British  Parliament. 
All  the  colonies,  either  through  fear,  or  from  influence  of  some 
kind  or  other,  had  remained  silent.  I  had  been  for  the  first 
time  elected  a  Burgess  a  few  days  before,  was  young,  inex 
perienced,  unacquainted  with  the  forms  of  the  House  and  the 
members  that  composed  it.  Finding  the  men  of  weight  averse 
to  opposition,  and  the  commencement  of  the  tax  at  hand,  and 
that  no  person  was  likely  to  step  forth,  I  determined  to  venture, 
and  alone,  unadvised,  and  unassisted,  on  a  blank  leaf  of  an  old 
law-book,  wrote  the  within.  Upon  offering  them  to  the  House, 
violent  debates  ensued.  Many  threats  were  uttered,  and  much 
abuse  cast  on  me  by  the  party  for  submission.  After  a  long 
and  warm  contest  the  resolutions  passed  by  a  very  small  major 
ity,  perhaps  of  one  or  two  only.  The  alarm  spread  throughout 
America  with  astonishing  quickness,  and  the  Ministerial  party 
were  overwhelmed.  The  great  point  of  resistance  to  British  tax 
ation  was  universally  established  in  the  colonies.  This  brought 
on  the  war  which  finally  separated  the  countries  and  gave  inde 
pendence  to  ours.  Whether  this  will  prove  a  blessing  or  a 
curse,  will  depend  upon  the  use  our  people  make  of  the  bless 
ings  which  a  gracious  God  hath  bestowed  upon  us.  If  they  be 
wise,  they  will  be  great  and  happy.  If  they  are  of  a  contrary 
character,  they  will  be  miserable.  Righteousness  alone  can  exalt 
them  as  a  nation.  Reader!  whoever  thou  art,  remember  this, 
and  in  thy  sphere  practice  virtue  thyself,  and  encourage  it  in 
others. — P.  HENRY." 

Having  hewn  his  five  pieces  of  timber,  Henry,  like  a 
'good  wood-chopper,  did  not  bother  about  the  chips. 
There  is  no  reference  in  his  memorandum  either  to  a 
missing  preamble  or  to  rejected  resolutions.  Those, 
however,  who  faithfully  follow  the  work  of  men  of  action 

100 


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THE  ORATOR  OF  NATURE 

must  take  note  even  of  chips,  in  a  contest  of  such  historic 
significance.  Accordingly,  Edmund  Randolph,  in  his 
manuscript  "  History  of  Virginia,"  Gordon,  in  his  "  His 
tory  of  the  American  Revolution,"  Marshall — his  father 
was  present  as  a  Burgess — in  his  "  Life  of  Washington," 
Richard  Frothingham,  in  his  "  Rise  of  the  Republic," 
and  other  writers,  dwell  upon  the  fact  that  two  resolu 
tions  were  lost  in  the  House,  though  by  no  means  lost 
upon  the  country.  There  is  a  reference  to  them  in 
Fauquier's  letter  to  the  Lords  of  Trade,  in  which  the 
Governor  explains  why  he  was  under  the  necessity  of 
dissolving  the  House  on  June  i.  Says  he : 

%<  I  am  informed  the  gentlemen  had  two  more  resolutions  in 
their  pocket,  but,  finding  the  difficulty  they  had  in  carrying  the 
fifth,  which  was  by  a  single  voice,  and  knowing  them  to  be  more 
virulent  and  inflammatory,  they  did  not  produce  them." 

Moses  Coit  Tyler  thinks  that  these  resolutions  should 
be  numbered  "six  "  and  "  seven."  They  are  as  follows : 

"Resolved,  That  his  Majesty's  liege  people,  the  inhabitants  of  v 
this  colony,  are  not  bound  to  yield  obedience  to  any  law  or 
ordinance  whatever,  designed  to  impose  any  taxation  whatso 
ever  upon  them,  other  than  the  laws  or  ordinances  of  the  Gen 
eral  Assembly  aforesaid. 

"  Resolved,  That  any  person  who  shall,  by  speaking  or  writ 
ing,  assert  or  maintain  that  any  person  or  persons,  other  than 
the  General  Assembly  of  this  colony,  have  any  right  or  power  to 
impose  or  lay  any  taxation  on  the  people  here,  shall  be  deemed 
an  enemy  of  his  Majesty's  colony." 

In  a  letter  to  the  Bishop  of  London,  Speaker  Robin 
son's  cousin,  the  Rev.  William  Robinson,  Commissary 
for  Virginia,  thus  pointedly  alludes  to  the  fact  that 
Henry  had  a  hand  in  the  seventh  resolution : 

"  The  concluding  resolve  which  he  [Henry]  offered  to  the 
House,  and  which  fell  among  the  rejected  ones,  was  that  any 
person  who  should  write  or  speak  in  favor  of  the  Act  of  Parlia- 

101 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

ment  for  laying  stamp  duties,  should  be  deemed  an  enemy  to  the 
colony  of  Virginia ;  such  notions  has  he  of  liberty  and  property 
as  well  as  of  authority." 

"  He  blazed  out  in  a  violent  speech,"  says  the  dis 
pleased  Commissary ;  "  he  is  spreading  treason." 

In  summing  up  with  respect  to  the  rejected  resolu 
tions,  Dr.  Tyler  says  that  Henry  probably  introduced 
the  preamble  and  the  whole  seven  resolutions;  that  the 
preamble  was  struck  out;  that  the  sixth  and  seventh 
.resolutions  were  lost  in  committee,  and  that  the  copy 
sent  North  was  made  prior  to  the  final  action.  Evi 
dence  of  haste  in  copying  for  post  is  found  in  the  fact 
that  the  third  resolution  was  omitted  bodily. 

Accurate  or  inaccurate,  sanctioned  or  spurious,  the 
unmodified  resolves  were  quick  to  circulate — North, 
South,  and  everywhere.  They  were  accepted  as  the 
voice  of  the  most  powerful  colony.  Philadelphia  passed 
them  along  to  New  York,  where,  as  Gordon  says,  "  they 
were  handed  about  with  great  privacy,"  being  accounted 
treasonable.  But  in  New  England  "  the  newspapers 
printed  them  far  and  wide,  without  any  reserve."  "  They 
gave  a  spring  to  all  the  discontented."  "  The  people  of 
Virginia  have  spoken  very  sensibly,"  declared  the  Boston 
Gazette,  "  and  the  frozen  politicians  of  a  more  northern 
government  say  they  have  spoken  treason."  Otis  was 
of  the  opinion  that  Henry  had  gone  too  far;  but  in  a 
little  while  he  became  responsive  to  the  fierce  spirit  now 
enkindled,  and  moved  forward  with  zeal.  One  feature 
of  the  new  situation  surprised  and  gratified  the  people 
of  Massachusetts.  A  hoary  bugaboo  in  some  parts  was 
that  England  might  seek  to  Anglicize  their  church.  But 
here,  now,  in  the  American  stronghold  of  episcopacy, 
was  clear  evidence  of  antagonism  to  the  King;  and  as 
for  Patrick  Henry,  was  it  not  he  who,  with  tongue  of 
wrath,  had  driven  forth  the  clergy  at  Hanover? 
"  Abiit,  excessit,  evasit,  erupit!"  The  Virginians  were 

102 


THE  ORATOR  OF  NATURE 

applauded.     "  Oh,  they  are  men !  "  said  the  old  patriot, 
Oxenbridge  Thacher,  speaking  from  his  deathbed ;  "  they 
are  noble  spirits !  "     "  This  is  the  way  the  fire  began," 
observes  Bancroft ;  "  Virginia  rang  the  alarm-bell  for  r- 
the  continent." 

Summer  was  just  opening,  and  six  months  remained 
before  the  Stamp  Act  would  go  into  effect.  Hence 
there  was  time  to  organize  resistance.  Not  even  Henry's 
words  were  more  frequently  in  the  mouths  of  the  people 
than  was  a  certain  glowing  and  highly  oratorical  passage 
from  the  speech  of  Barre,  who  had  served  in  America 
with  Wolfe,  and  who  now  sat  as  a  Whig  in  the  House 
of  Commons  :  "  They  planted  by  your  care !  No ;  your 
oppression  planted  them  in  America.  Nourished  by  your 
indulgence !  They  grew  up  by  your  neglect  of  them. 
They  protected  by  your  arms !  Those  sons  of  liberty 
have  nobly  taken  up  arms  in  your  defence."  "  Sons  of 
liberty " — a  happy  phrase  minted  in  rare  purity  of 
flame — was  caught  up  by  the  men  now  banded  together 
in  all  parts  of  the  continent.  Secret  at  first,  these  clubs 
in  time  came  out  from  under  cover.  They  were  no 
mere  juntos.  They  developed  into  open  societies  for  the 
propagation  of  the  doctrine  of  colonial  rights  and  the 
idea  of  continental  unity.  Patriotic  letters,  fraternal 
greetings,  and  solemn  pledges  passed  between  them. 
Women  joined  in  the  agitation.  Their  plan  was  for 
passive  resistance;  "Frugality  and  Industry"  their 
motto.  They  meant  to  ignore  England.  They  them 
selves  would  supply  the  necessities  of  their  own  house 
holds.  To  quote  Frothingham :  "  The  Virginia  resolves, 
as  circulated  in  the  press,  declaring  no  obedience  to  the 
Stamp  Act,  strengthened  the  purpose  of  these  associ 
ations.  Their  organization  from  the  first  meant  business 
of  a  most  determined  character.  It  was  Cromwellian  in 
its  aims,  going  straight  to  the  mark  of  forcible  resist- 


103 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

Barely  a  fortnight  after  the  adoption  of  the  resolu 
tions,  Fauquier  wrote  to  the  Ministry :  "  Government  is 
set  at  defiance.  .  .  .  The  private  distress  which 
every  man  feels  increases  the  general  dissatisfaction  at 
the  duties  laid  by  the  Stamp  Act,  which  breaks  out  and 
shows  itself  upon  every  trifling  occasion."  Even  Par 
son  Maury  admired  Henry's  "  doctrine  of  liberty."  The 
taxation  threat,  he  wrote  to  a  friend  in  London,  "  struck 
us  with  the  most  universal  consternation  that  ever  seized 
a  people  so  widely  diffused."  Every  province  in  America 
was  resisting.  "  For  this,"  added  the  good  man,  "  some 
may  brand  us  with  the  odious  name  of  rebels,  and  others 
may  applaud  us  for  that  generous  love  of  liberty  which 
we  inherit  from  our  forefathers." 

With  a  fixed  and  critical  date — a  turning-point — on 
ahead,  the  people  moved  towards  it  with  increasing  per 
turbation.  As  in  a  great  election  contest,  the  nearer 
the  approach  to  the  decisive  day,  the  more  intense  was 
the  feeling.  Thus  the  situation  grew  angrier  month  by 
month,  and  in  August  there  were  riotous  demonstrations 
against  the  distributers  of  stamps.  Golden,  Lieutenant- 
Governor  in  New  York,  set  his  face  against  the  agitators. 
They  seized  his  chariot,  placed  effigies  of  himself  and  the 
devil  side  by  side  in  the  vehicle,  dragged  it  through  the 
streets,  and  at  last  burned  it  vengefully  and  with  acclaim. 
Newspapers  grew  violent,  and  Bradford's  Pennsylvania 
Journal  came  out  with  skulls  and  cross-bones  pictured 
upon  its  title-piece,  and  announced  in  bold-face  type, 
"  The  Times  are  Dreadful,  Dismal,  Doleful,  Dolorous, 
and  Dollar-less." 

But  New  England  took  the  lead.  It  was  Massachusetts 
that  gave  signs  of  true  revolutionary  heat.  Boston  was 
the  seat  of  protest  and  the  centre  of  recusancy.  Then 
it  was  that  Faneuil  Hall  took  on  the  attributes  of  a 
patriotic  shrine.  On  the  I4th  of  August  a  mob  burned 
an  effigy  of  Andrew  Oliver,  a  stamp  distributer,  raising 

104 


THE  ORATOR  OF  NATURE 

the  cry,  "  Liberty,  Property,  and  No  Stamps !  "  Fear 
ing  fire  for  himself,  Oliver  resigned.  All  other  dis 
tributers  the  country  over  likewise  gave  up  their  offices. 
But  the  ferment  grew  apace.  On  the  2ist  of  August 
rioters  sacked  the  house  of  Chief-Justice  Hutchinson. 
Wherever  boxes  of  stamps  could  be  traced,  they  were 
seized  and  destroyed.  All  told,  there  were  fourteen 
popular  risings  in  as  many  cities  and  towns. 

Meantime,  there  was  no  lack  of  effort  to  coordinate 
the  forces  of  revolt.  "  One  single  Act  of  Parliament/' 
says  Otis,  "  had  set  people  a-thinking  in  six  months 
more  than  they  had  ever  done  in  their  whole  lives  be 
fore/'  Otis  did  not  believe  in  rioting  so  much  as  in 
legitimate  agitation.  He  was  among  those  who  felt  that 
some  of  the  current  disorders  and  intimidations  were  a 
reproach  upon  a  Christian  land.  Tumult  may  be  merely 
senseless.  He  was  wise  enough  to  see  that  rowdies 
could  never  break  down  a  bad  government,  much  less 
set  up  a  good  one.  Effigy-burning  had  in  it  the  elements 
of  boys'  play.  He  was  a  man  of  moods,  and  at  times 
the  hurrah  over  the  smashing  of  window-glass  must  have 
made  him  feel  the  pettiness  of  a  brick-bat  protest,  and 
the  pity  of  it.  Again,  in  another  mood,  the  glory  of  the 
new  world,  its  hope,  its  promise,  its  God-given  immen 
sities,  came  to  him  as  in  a  vision,  and  his  patriotic  fervor 
was  intense.  Being  imaginative,  he  foresaw,  as  Henry 
did,  though  in  certain  processes  of  speculative  reasoning 
they  were  not  at  all  alike. 

While  the  news  of  Henry's  resistance  speech  was  on 
the  way  up  from  Virginia,  Otis  was  planning  a  Stamp 
Act  Congress.  The  idea  of  such  a  general  assembly 
of  conferees  was  familiar.  New  England  had  tried  the 
plan  locally;  Franklin  had  caused  it  to  be  tried  in  the 
Albany  Congress  when  the  times,  though  demanding 
cooperative  effort,  were  unripe  for  union.  Even  now 
there  was  disbelief  in  its  legality  and  utility,  and  the 

105 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

King's  men  opposed  it  as  a  mischief  and  a  menace. 
Altogether  lukewarm  had  been  the  first  reception  of  the 
Otis  proposal ;  in  truth,  the  project  languished  until 
Henry  rang  what  Governor  Bernard  of  Massachusetts 
called  "  an  alarm-bell  to  the  disaffected."  After  that 
the  plan  was  executed.  Nine  colonies  sent  delegates — 
the  politic  Bernard  being  at  pains  to  associate  two 
Government  men  with  Otis,  while  Fauquier,  in  Virginia, 
smothered  representation  from  that  quarter. 

But  there  were  some  staunch  and  able  Whigs  in  the 
company  that  met  in  the  City  Hall,  New  York,  on  the 
7th  of  October — Gadsden,  Lynch,  Rutledge,  Dickinson, 
the  Livingstons,  and  others.  Frothingham  declares  that 
New  York  then  "  abounded  with  the  bitterness,  strife, 
and  all  the  elements  of  a  political  paroxysm,"  The  Sons 
of  Liberty  were  numerous,  active,  and  bold.  They  had 
a  new  cry,  "  A  Continental  Union !  "  General  Gage's 
headquarters  were  there.  With  the  powers  of  a  viceroy, 
he  winked  at  various  happenings  and  took  cognizance 
of  others.  There  were  ships  of  war  in  the  harbor,  and 
within  the  city  itself  was  a  fort  mounted  with  cannon. 

Otis  was  the  chief  speaker  in  the  Congress ;  and, 
next  to  him,  Gadsden  stands  out  as  its  most  sterling 
figure.  It  was  as  if  Gadsden,  traversing  Virginia  on 
the  way  North,  had  caught  some  of  Henry's  spirit.  He 
opposed  the  plan  of  sending  further  petitions  to  Parlia 
ment,  and  assailed  the  proposition  that  the  people  should 
base  their  liberties  upon  royal  charters.  "  We  should 
stand,"  said  he,  "  upon  the  broad  common  ground  of 
those  natural  rights  that  we  all  feel  and  know  as  men  and 
as  descendants  of  Englishmen.  I  wish  the  charters  may 
not  ensnare  us  at  last,  by  drawing  different  colonies  to 
act  differently  in  this  great  cause.  Whenever  that  is  the 
case,  all  will  be  over  with  the  whole.  There  ought  to 
be  no  New  England  man,  no  New  Yorker,  known  on 
the  continent,  but  all  of  us  Americans." 

106 


THE  ORATOR  OF  NATURE 

What  would  have  happened  if  Henry  had  been  there 
to  storm  and  stampede  the  house  is  matter  for  interest 
ing,  if  idle,  speculation;  but  Gadsden  was  unable  to 
force  his  views  upon  a  body  still  somewhat  subservient, 
and  chilled  to  caution  by  the  presence  of  men  wedded 
to  the  party  of  prerogative.  Eleven  days  the  debate 
lasted.  Then  there  was  a  declaration  of  rights  and 
grievances.  Fourteen  resolutions  were  adopted.  With 
"  all  due  subordination  to  that  august  body,  the  Parlia 
ment,"  its  recent  acts  were  arraigned  as  having  "  a 
manifest  tendency  to  subvert  the  rights  and  liberties 
of  the  people."  The  privilege  of  self-taxation  and  the 
right  of  trial  by  jury  were  asserted.  It  is  doubtful 
whether  Henry,  if  a  delegate,  could  have  heard  the 
sentiment,  "  We  glory  in  being  subjects  of  the  best  of 
Kings,"  without  getting  upon  his  feet  and  flashing  forth 
a  protest  that  would  have  scorched  out  the  adulatory 
passage  and  robbed  his  Majesty  of  an  insincere  compli 
ment.  As  it  was,  the  happenings  outside  the  hall  were 
more  in  keeping  with  the  tumultuous  spirit  abroad  than 
those  within.  The  Tory  chairman  challenged  an  ex 
asperating  Whig  member  to  a  duel,  only  to  have  his 
valor  ooze  out,  "  Bob  Acres  "  fashion,  overnight.  A 
delegate,  too,  was  hanged — in  effigy;  and  that  was  the 
end  of  a  convention  chiefly  memorable  as  the  forerunner 
of  the  Continental  Congress  of  1774. 

Meanwhile,  Henry's  resolves  were  serving  as  the  pat 
tern  for  similar  resolutions  in  various  assemblies.  Eight 
colonies  adopted  such  resolutions,  and  in  some  instances 
the  wording  was  identical  with  that  of  the  Virginia 
series. 

Long  before  the  first  of  November,  it  was  evident  that 
only  by  sending  great  numbers  of  troops  to  America 
could  the  Government  of  Great  Britain  enforce  the 
Stamp  Act.  Commerce  was  suffering;  London  traders 
who  dealt  with  America  were  apprehensive.  Pitt  left  his 

107 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

bed  to  speak  for  repeal,  and  that  winter  the  law  was 
withdrawn.  King  George  signed  the  repeal  on  the  i8th 
of  March,  1766.  In  his  capital  "  bow-bells  were  set 
a-ringing,  the  ships  in  the  Thames  displayed  their  colors, 
and  London  streets  were  illuminated."  But  if  there 
was  so  much  rejoicing  in  England,  how  great  must  have 
been  the  jubilation  in  America !  The  long  tumult  was 
over — the  victory  won,  the  principle  established.  So 
must  have  thought  the  thousands  who  welcomed  the  glad 
tidings;  but  they  were  premature  in  their  acclaim,  and 
especially  in  their  praise  of  the  King.  His  Majesty  was 
a  most  stubborn  and  persistent  man.  To  the  repeal  of 
the  Stamp  Act  his  Ministry  had  affixed  a  Declaratory 
Act.  It  pleased  the  Tory  Britons  then  in  power  to 
assert  that  it  was  one  of  the  rights  of  Parliament  to 
tax  America  "  in  all  cases  whatsoever." 

To  those  who  think  we  have  dwelt  too  long  upon 
events  connected  with  Henry's  stand  on  the  Stamp  Act. 
an  apology  is  made ;  and  to  those  who  feel  that  they 
have  been  inadequately  sketched,  we  doubly  apologize. 
They  were  the  direct  consequences  of  his  resolves  and 
fiery  contention  in  the  House  of  Burgesses.  Jefferson 
said,  "  Mr.  Henry  certainly  gave  the  first  impulse  to  the 
ball  of  the  Revolution ; ''  and  Lord  Brougham,  in  his 
*'  Political  Philosophy,"  speaks  of  this  same  Revolution 
as  "  the  most  important  event  in  the  history  of  our 
species."  We  may,  if  we  like,  interpolate  "  one  of  the 
most  important  events,"  and  tone  down  the  eloquent 
lord's  superlative  phraseology ;  but  the  glory  of  a  great 
fact  will  still  remain.  Like  Jefferson,  Edmund  Randolph 
got  to  be  at  odds  with  Henry,  yet  Randolph  wrote :  "  On 
May  29,  1765,  Mr.  Henry  plucked  the  veil  from  the 
shrine  of  parliamentary  omnipotence."  Grigsby  declares 
that  the  passage  of  Henry's  resolves  was  "  the  first  great 
blow  which  British  supremacy  received  on  this  side 
of  the  Atlantic."  It  was  "  the  first  great  act  of  the 

108 


THE  ORATOR  OF  NATURE 

drama  of  the  Revolution."  Henry's  words,  concludes 
Woodrow  Wilson,  "  were  the  first  words  of  a  revolution, 
and  no  man  ever  thought  just  the  same  after  he  had 
read  them." 

Washington,  writing  of  the  Stamp  Act,  thus  expressed 
himself :  "  Had  the  Parliament  of  Great  Britain  resolved 
upon  enforcing  it,  the  consequences,  I  conceive,  would 
have  been  more  direful  than  is  generally  apprehended, 
both  to  the  mother  country  and  to  her  colonies." 

Had  the  King  and  Parliament  sent  over  some  tens 
of  thousands  of  troops  fresh  from  Pitt's  great  school  of 
war,  and  had  those  troops,  as  incidents  of  a  quick  cam 
paign,  seized  upon  Otis  of  Massachusetts  and  Henry  of 
Virginia,  what  would  have  happened  to  the  two  men?  It 
is  doubtful  whether  Otis  would  have  been  hanged.  In 
the  Stamp  Act  agitation  he  was  more  guarded  than 
Henry.  His  approach  to  the  desired  end  was  slower. 
"  A  redress  of  grievances,  not  a  revolution  of  govern 
ment,  was  my  wish,"  said  Edmund  Pendleton ;  and  this 
expresses  the  attitude  of  Otis  in  the  Stamp  Act  Congress. 
'  The  orator  of  Virginia,"  thinks  William  Wirt  Henry, 
"  went  a  bow-shot  beyond  the  orator  of  Massachusetts." 

But  there  shall  be  no  nice  balancing  here  as  to 
whether  Otis  or  Henry  should  hold  priority  as  the 
pioneer  of  the  Revolution.  There  is  a  controversy  about 
it,  and  the  controversialists  will  continue  to  split  hairs 
for  a  long  time  to  come.  They  are  like  Judge  Dooly,  of 
Georgia,  who,  having  challenged  his  political  opponent, 
Judge  Tait,  to  fight  a  duel,  was  distressed  when  he 
reached  the  ground  to  discover  that  Tait  had  a  wooden 
leg.  It  was  not  sympathy  with  Tait  that  caused  the 
distress ;  for  Dooly  insisted  that  one  of  his  own  legs 
should  be  cased  in  a  hollow  tree  to  offset  the  other's 
advantage. 

No  one  can  add  to  Henry's  fame  by  belittling  Otis; 
and,  conversely,  no  one  can  brighten  the  Otis  halo  by 

109 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

seeking  to  diminish  that  of  the  orator  whose  decisive 
utterances,  in  the  very  nick  of  controversy,  determined 
the  course  of  empire.  A  sincere  man,  Otis  gave  up 
his  office  as  Advocate-General  in  order  that  he  might 
be  free  to  do  what  he  thought  was  right.  Struck  down 
with  a  cane  in  the  hands  of  a  King's  officer,  Otis,/like 
Sumner  in  a  later  epoch,  never  regained  his  mental  fire. 
That  he  died  by  lightning-stroke  adds  to  the  tragic 
aspect  of  his  glorious  life. 

Otis  and  Henry  pair  well  together,  for  Henry  also 
was  a  sincere  man.  Sometimes  he  mingled  a  dry  humor 
with  his  sincerest  expressions.  Like  Lincoln,  he  could 
joke  about  himself,  if  a  touch  of  pleasantry  served  to 
relieve  a  situation.  Judge  Tyler  says: 

"  In  a  conversation  with  him  once  at  his  own  house,  upon 
his  first  essay  into  the  political  world,  I  asked  him  how  he  ven 
tured  to  lift  up  his  voice  against  so  terrible  a  junto  as  that  he 
had  to  oppose,  when  he  first  stirred  the  country  to  assert  its 
political  rights.  His  reply  was,  that  he  was  convinced  of  the 
rectitude  of  the  cause  and  his  own  views,  and  that  although  he 
knew  that  many  a  just  cause  had  been  lost,  and  for  wise  pur 
poses  Providence  might  not  interfere  for  its  safety,  yet  he  was 
well  acquainted  with  the  great  extent  of  our  back  country, 
which  would  always  afford  him  a  safe  retreat  from  tyranny,  but 
he  was  always  satisfied  that  a  united  sentiment  and  sound 
patriotism  would  carry  us  safely  to  the  wished-for  port,  and  if 
the  people  would  not  die  or  be  free,  it  was  of  no  consequence 
what  sort  of  government  they  lived  under." 

So,  whatever  might  have  happened  to  Otis,  it  is  doubt 
ful  whether  Henry  would  have  permitted  himself  to 
be  caught  for  purposes  of  hanging.* 

*  It  may  be  that,  while  talking  with  Tyler,  Henry  had  in 
mind  the  Stamp  Act  song: 

"With  the  Beasts  of  the  Wood,  we  will  ramble  for  Food, 
And  lodge  in  wild  Desarts  and  Caves: 
And  live  Poor  as  Job  on  the  Skirts  of  the  Globe, 
Before  we'll  submit  to  be  Slaves." 
no 


THE  ORATOR  OF  NATURE 

He  was  now  a  continental  celebrity.  In  Virginia, 
says  Jefferson,  "  Mr.  Henry  took  the  lead  out  of  the 
hands  of  those  who  had  heretofore  guided  the  proceed 
ings  of  the  House,  that  is  to  say,  of  Pendleton,  Wythe, 
Bland,  Randolph,  and  Nicholas/'  William  Wirt  well 
expresses  a  similar  idea  when  he  says  that  "  after  this 
debate  there  was  no  longer  a  question  among  the  body 
of  the  people  as  to  Mr.  Henry's  being  the  first  states 
man  and  orator  in  Virginia.  Those,  indeed,  whose 
ranks  he  had  scattered,  and  whom  he  had  thrown  into 
the  shade,  still  tried  to  brand  him  with  the  names  of  de- 
claimer  and  demagogue.  But  this  was  obviously  the 
effect  of  envy  and  mortified  pride.  .  .  .  From  the 
period  of  which  we  have  been  speaking,  Mr.  Henry 
became  the  idol  of  the  people  of  Virginia."  "  His,  in 
deed/'  says  William  Cabell  Rives,  in  the  "  Life  and 
Times  of  Madison,"  "  was  a  distinguished  and  splendid 
role.  By  his  ever  memorable  resolutions  in  opposition 
to  the  Stamp  Act,  and  the  lofty  eloquence  with  which 
he  sustained  them,  he  struck  a  timely  blow  which  re 
sounded  throughout  America  and  the  world,  and  roused 
a  spirit  that  never  slumbered  till  its  great  work  was 
accomplished.  The  moment  was  opportune  and  critical ; 
and  he  seized  it  with  a  bold  and  felicitous  energy  that 
belonged  to  his  ardent  and  impassioned  nature.  His 
was  the  temperament  and  the  genius  of  the  great  popu 
lar  orator,  that  fitted  him  to  lead  at  such  a  moment, 
and*,  like  Aaron,  to  proclaim  the  divine  message  of 
freedom  to  his  countrymen,  and  of  wrath  and  denunci 
ation  to  their  oppressors." 


in 


VI 

HIS   PROGRESS — HIS   PERSONALITY 

HENRY  had  now  lived  almost  half  his  life.  He  was 
twenty-nine  when,  by  his  Stamp  Act  stroke,  he  became 
a  continental  celebrity;  he  was  thirty-nine  when  he  de 
livered  his  most  powerful  and  celebrated  oration.  The 
intervening  decade  was  one  of  progress  with  him.  He 
grew  in  power,  in  popularity,  and  to  some  extent  in 
fortune.  Let  us  first  outline  his  private  and  professional 
life  during  these  ten  years,  and  then  attempt  to  draw 
nearer  to  him  than  we  have  so  far  been — to  get  at  his 
looks,  his  habits,  and  such  personal  minutiae  as  may  help 
us  to  feel  that  we  are  actually  acquainted  with  the  man 
himself. 

"  Roundabout,"  in  Louisa  County,  was  his  home  dur 
ing  the  three  years  next  following  the  date  of  his 
Stamp  Act  triumph.  His  father,  who,  with  Master 
Walker,  still  kept  at  "  Mount  Brilliant "  a  classical 
school  of  some  twenty  pupils,  had  turned  over  to  him 
the  "  Roundabout  "  farm  in  payment  of  a  loan.  Patrick 
also  bought  the  rights  of  a  map  *  of  Virginia  upon 

*  The  manuscript  Journal  of  the  House  of  Burgesses  for  1766, 
lately  copied  in  London,  shows  that  on  Nov.  10  a  memorial  of 
Colonel  John  Henry  on  the  subject  of  this  map  was  read  and 
referred.  He  set  forth  the  advantages  that  would  accrue  from 
"  an  accurate  survey  "  of  the  colony.  He  wished  to  have  the 
roads  measured  and  marked,  and  claimed  that  the  public  would 
then  know  whether  venire  men  and  witnesses  travelling  to  the 
General  Court  were  getting  their  due  or  more  than  they  de 
served.  He  pointed  out  the  benefit  that  would  arise  from  mark 
ing  the  shoals  in  the  Chesapeake  and  the  rivers.  Lastly,  there 
should  be  a  colony  map  and  a  map  for  each  county,  "  together 
with  the  most  curious  and  entertaining  observations  relative  to 

112 


HIS  PROGRESS 

which  Colonel  Henry  had  spent  time  and  money. 
"  Colonel  Henry's  fortune  was  much  reduced  from  a 
want  of  good  management  and  knowledge  of  plantation 
affairs,"  says  Colonel  Meredith.  So  the  son  dutifully 
stood  by  the  father,  who  was  good  enough  at  map- 
making  and  good  at  Greek,  but  not  good  in  ordinary 
business.  Here  at  hand  is  a  manuscript  letter  written 
by  the  old  gentleman.  It  deals  zestfully  with  a  certain 
Greek  verb,  and  intimates  that  the  true  inwardness  of 
this  same  verb  will  be  further  probed  by  the  very  next 
mail.  He  died  in  February,  1773,  having  dwelt  in 
America  some  fifty  years. 

Before  us,  also,  is  a  present-day  letter  from  Captain 
W.  T.  Meade,  of  Louisa,  who  tells  us  of  "  Roundabout " : 

"  Tradition  says  that  Mr.  Henry  settled  in  this  county  in 
1764,  and  left  here  in  1767.  This  may  be  correct,  though  there 
was  a  conveyance  of  land  in  1770,  as  well  as  in  1764.  In  look 
ing  over  the  county  records,  Mr.  Henry's  name  is  frequently 
seen.  One  item  is  to  the  effect  that  Patrick  Henry,  junior,  con 
veyed  to  John  Henry  a  tract  of  land  on  Fork  and  Roundabout 
creeks.  I  knew  the  building  in  which  Mr.  Henry  is  said  to 
have  lived,  just  one  hundred  years  after  his  residence  there.  It 
was  a  story-and-a-half  structure,  about  20  by  18  feet,  with  a 
shed  on  the  north  side.  This  shed  was  well  finished  off  as  a  bed 
room,  which,  added  to  one  and  often  two  bedrooms  upstairs  in 
the  main  building,  furnished  the  sleeping  apartments  for  the 
household.  Around  every  Virginia  mansion  there  were  scat 
tered  several  small  buildings  which  served  the  purpose  of 
kitchens,  lumber-rooms,  pantries,  and  smoke-houses ;  and  there 
was  almost  always  one  which  was  fitted  up  as  a  bedroom  for 
the  boys  of  the  establishment.  These  outhouses  were  called 
into  requisition  when  there  was  an  unusual  number  of  visitors ; 
so  that  a  description  of  a  mansion  gives  a  very  inadequate  idea 
of  the  proprietor's  capacity  for  entertaining  his  guests.  At  the 

the  country,  its  Productions,  number  of  inhabitants,  Rarities, 
Trade,  and  whatever  else  may  be  judged  proper  to  be  inserted 
in  the  Vacant  Places  of  the  said  Maps."  John  Henry's  map 
of  Virginia  is  described  at  length  in  the  Historical  Magazine 
for  September,  1863,  VII,  286-288. 
8  113 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

time  that  I  first  knew  the  premises,  forty-two  years  ago,  there 
were  many  such  outbuildings  at  '  Roundabout,'  but  none,  I 
think,  that  had  been  there  during  Mr.  Henry's  occupancy. 
These  buildings  have  now  (1906)  all  gone  down. 

"  The  situation  is  a  pretty  one.  It  is  on  a  hill  which  com 
mands  a  beautiful  view  of  the  Roundabout  Valley,  and  is  about 
three  hundred  yards  from  the  little  creek  of  that  name.  A  hun 
dred  and  forty  years  ago  it  was  just  between  two  great  thor 
oughfares  that  led  from  the  mountains  to  the  seaboard;  and 
tradition  says  that  the  location  was  then  considered  one  of  the 
best  in  this  region. 

"As  to  reminiscences  of  Mr.  Henry's  Louisa  life,  my  old 
neighbor,  Captain  William  Perkins,  used  to  say  that  his  father, 
who  joined  farms  with  Mr.  Henry,  told  him  that  he  (Henry) 
was  a'  great  sportsman  and  an  expert  with  rod  and  rifle.  He 
always  walked  to  court,  carrying  his  gun,  and  hunting  by  the 
way.  This  old  neighbor,  who  owned  Henry's  '  Roundabout ' 
place,  belonged  to  a  family  noted  for  its  longevity.  He  died 
about  1870,  at  88.  His  father  died  at  98,  and  his  grandfather 
at  109.  His  mother  is  said  to  have  danced  a  jig  at  103." 

Henry  not  only  helped  his  father,  but  likewise  ad 
vanced  money  to  save  his  father-in-law,  Shelton,  from 
business  sacrifices.  In  one  of  the  fee-books  is  an  account 
of  how  the  money-making  lawyer  thus  acquired  3,335 
acres  of  wild  land  on  Moccasin  Creek  and  the  Holston, 
and  of  his  long  journey  thither  in  company  with  his 
brother  and  William  Christian,  then  a  law-student  in 
Henry's  office,  and  soon  to  marry  a  much-loved  sister, 
Anne.  The  memorandum  in  the  fee-book  does  not  tell 
of  the  party's  route  to  the  wilderness,  or  of  their  adven 
tures  there ;  but  the  expedition  brings  to  mind  Henry's 
liking  for  the  "  back  country  "  and  his  disposition  to 
roam.  In  this  respect  he  had  something  of  the  Indian 
in  him,  just  as  he  had  in  his  eloquence.  To  break  camp 
in  Hanover  and  move  to  Louisa,  or  quit  Louisa  for 
Hanover,  did  not  ruffle  him.  Weightier  affairs  soon 
lessened  his  love  for  rod  and  rifle ;  but  in  his  best  hunting 
days  he  must  have  felt  allurement  in  the  "  Three-chop  " 
road — a  forest  trail  so  called  because  one  could  follow  it 

114 


HIS  PROGRESS 

from  tidewater  to  the  gap  of  the  Rivanna  by  the  sign 
of  triple  axe-marks  in  the  bark  of  trees  along  the  way. 
What  a  message  from  man  to  man  these  axe-marks 
were ! — "  There's  a  continent  to  conquer ;  come  on !  " 

Henry  is  said  to  have  hunted  deer  "  several  days  to 
gether,  carrying  his  provisions  with  him,  and  encamping 
out  in  the  woods  of  nights."  After  the  hunt  "  he  would 
go  to  Louisa  Court  clad  in  a  coarse  cloth  coat,  greasy 
leather  breeches,  and  a  pair  of  saddle-bags  on  his  arm  " 
— and  win  his  cases.  How  much  better  it  would  be  if 
we  could  go  with  him  into  the  forest,  among  the  wild 
grapes  and  plums,  where  there  was  plenty  of  honey 
comb  in  the  tree-hollows — how  much  more  thrilling  it 
would  be  if  we  could  give  the  details  of  a  deer-chase, 
with  Henry  hallooing  his  wildest,  and  turn  our  backs 
upon  the  figures  in  the  fee-books  now  under  our  eye! 
But  life  had  become  more  serious  for  him.  His  hunting 
days  were  about  over.  Not  that  he  ever  ceased  to  be 
a  son  of  Nature.  He  always  retained  certain  marked 
characteristics  of  a  country-bred  man,  and  the  longings, 
too ;  and  he  appreciated  the  wholesomeness  of  what  we 
call  "  roughing  it."  Work  it  was  that  weaned  him  away 
from  the  woods;  and,  in  following  his  work,  we  must 
turn  to  the  fee-book  figures  and  repeat  a  few  of  them 
here.  They  indicate  that  he  was  hard  at  it  right  along — 
that  he  had  in  mind  the  welfare  of  his  increasing  family 
at  "Roundabout."  In  1765  his  law  cases  numbered 
557;  in  1766,  a  time  of  political  turmoil,  114;  in  1767, 
554;  and  in  1768,  354.  Furthermore,  these  fee-book 
figures  serve  to  gauge  the  rising  Revolutionary  tide. 
In  1769  Henry  charged  132  fees;  in  1770,  94;  in  1771, 
100;  in  1772,  43;  in  1773,  7;  in  1774,  not  one.  Private 
quarrels  became  more  and  more  infrequent  under  pres 
sure  of  the  great  public  quarrel.  Business  was  inter 
rupted,  and  often  the  courts  did  not  sit. 

Though  Henry's  practice  extended  to  other  counties, 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

it  was  mainly  in  Louisa,  Goochland,  and  Hanover, 
whither  he  returned  with  his  family  in  1768.  The  fol 
lowing  year  we  find  him  in  the  General  Court  at  Wil- 
liamsburg;  and  in  1771  it  was  made  known  throughout 
the  colony  that  he  had  succeeded  to  the  practice  of  no 
less  a  man  than  Robert  Carter  Nicholas.  Still  rising  in 
the  world,  Henry  bought  "  Scotchtown,"  in  Hanover, 
where  he  lived  for  five  years.  It  may  be  assumed  that 
Nicholas,  who  stood  at  the  head  of  the  Virginia  bar, 
knew  Henry's  capacity  as  a  lawyer.  Others  were  not 
so  free  to  admit  that  the  Hanover  genius  was  sound 
in  his  legal  knowledge.  They  were  like  the  sarcastic 
Baron  Alderson,  who,  when  Brougham — il  the  tremen 
dous  Harry  " — was  made  Lord  Chancellor,  is  reported 
to  have  said :  "  What  a  wonderfully  versatile  mind  has 
Brougham  !  He  knows  politics,  Greek,  history,  science ; 
if  he  only  knew  a  little  law,  he  would  know  a  little  of 
everything/'  Sarcasms  were  flung  at  Henry,  too.  At 
the  same  time,  his  detractors  were  obliged  to  admit  that 
he  frequently  accomplished  things.  For  instance,  he 
appeared  in  the  Court  of  Admiralty  as  counsel  for  a 
Spanish  captain  whose  vessel  and  cargo  had  been  libelled. 
Concerning  his  triumph  there,  Nathaniel  Pope  writes: 

"  I  heard  Captain  George  Dabney,  who  was  present,  say  that 
the  judge  who  presided  [William  Nelson]  after  the  trial  was 
over  declared  that  he  never  heard  a  more  eloquent  or  argu 
mentative  speech  in  his  life ;  that  he  was  greatly  superior  to 
Pendleton,  Mason,  or  any  other  counsel  who  spoke  in  the  cause, 
and  that  he  was  '  astonished  how  Mr.  Henry  should  have 
acquired  such  a  knowledge  of  the  maritime  law,  to  which  he 
supposed  he  had  never  before  turned  his  attention.'  " 

Various  "  Henry  traits  "  are  spoken  of  in  Virginia. 
They  include  the  captivating  gesture,  a  smile  that  plays 
about  the  mouth,  and  a  spirited  use  of  the  eyes — "  the 
Patrick  flash."  Some  ladies,  driving  along  a  Virginia 
field  road,  remarked  to  each  other  upon  the  ungainli- 

116 


THE   AYLETT    PORTRAIT 

(This  head  is  from  a  painting  of  Patrick  Henry,  long  in  the 
possession  of  the  Aylett  family,  and  now  owned  by  Mrs.  Thomas  P. 
Boiling,  of  Richmond.  It  is  not  from  life.) 


HIS  PROGRESS 

ness  of  a  tall  young  man  just  ahead.  Evidently  the 
youth  had  never  been  a  military  cadet.  His  slouch  hat 
and  the  slouch  in  his  walk  were  of  a  piece.  But  there 
was  a  gate  across  the  road.  He  put  down  a  fishing-rod, 
and  swung  the  gate  wide  open.  As  he  did  so,  he  bowed, 
smiled,  stood  erect  like  a  lord.  The  act  so  surprised 
and  charmed  the  ladies  that  they  spoke  of  it  later. 
"  Oh,"  said  the  person  addressed,  "  he's  one  of  old  Pat 
rick's  descendants — those  are  the  Henry  traits.  You've 
really  seen  Patrick  Henry." 

Patrick  Henry's  physical  measurements  are  not  so  ex 
actly  known  to  us  as  those  of  General  Washington. 
Houdon  handed  down  a  marble  Washington  modelled  to 
a  hair  upon  the  great  original.  We  even  have  a  trace  of 
a  Washington  smile ;  for  it  is  said  that  when  his  face 
was  encased  in  Houdon's  plaster  and  he  heard  his  wife 
approaching,  he  suddenly  realized  the  ludicrousness  of 
his  situation  and  cracked  the  mask  by  the  uncontrollable 
play  of  his  mouth-muscles.  But  Houdon  did  not  copy 
Henry's  lineaments;  nor  did  Saint  Memin,  who  traced 
on  pink  paper  and  finished  in  black  crayon  the  life-size 
profiles  of  some  eight  hundred  Americans  of  that  gener 
ation.  By  his  use  of  the  physionotrace  and  pantograph, 
Saint  Memin  served  us  well — much  better  than  did  some 
of  the  old  mezzotint  engravers,  who  did  not  scruple  to 
pass  off  one  man's  portrait  for  that  of  another.  Thus 
a  German  of  a  by-gone  age,  who  actually  had  four  plates, 
scratched  enough  faces  out  of  them  to  illustrate  a  book 
on  all  the  celebrities  of  the  world.  Henry  looked  like 
Captain  Cook,  the  navigator,  and  an  unscrupulous  pub 
lisher  is  said  to  have  made  his  Cook  engraving  do  for 
both ;  whence  arose  a  taking  tale.  It  was  said  that  Sully 
"  constructed  "  his  Henry  portrait  from  a  Captain  Cook 
print,  supplemented  by  the  recollections  of  men  who  had 
known  the  great  orator.  Sully  did  nothing  of  the  sort. 
William  Wirt  Henry  writes : 

117 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

"  During  the  trial  of  the  British  Debt  cause  in  the  United 
States  Court  at  Richmond,  a  French  artist  attended,  and  painted 
a  miniature  of  Patrick  Henry,  representing  him  as  speaking. 
The  artist  presented  the  miniature,  set  in  gold,  to  Mr.  Henry, 
who  afterward  gave  it  to  the  wife  of  his  half-brother,  Mrs.  John 
Syme.  While  Mr.  Wirt  was  preparing  his  '  Life '  of  Mr.  Henry, 
he  was  allowed  by  the  Flemings,  descendants  of  Colonel  Syme, 
to  have  a  portrait  painted  by  Thomas  Sully,  of  Philadelphia, 
from  this  miniature.  The  artist  copied  the  miniature,  with 
some  slight  alterations  as  to  the  wig,  suggested  by  Chief- 
Justice  Marshall.  The  portrait  when  completed  was  entrusted 
to  Mr.  James  Webster,  the  publisher  of  Mr.  Wirt's  '  Life  of  Pat 
rick  Henry,'  in  order  that  it  might  be  engraved  for  the  forth 
coming  volume.  Afterward  Mr.  Wirt,  while  Attorney-General 
of  the  United  States,  presented  the  portrait  to  John  Henry, 
who  was  living  at  Red  Hill  with  his  mother.  He  was  too  young 
when  his  father  died  to  have  remembered  him,  but  his  mother 
and  older  brothers  and  sisters  pronounced  it  the  best  likeness 
they  ever  saw  of  Patrick  Henry." 

Chief-Justice  Marshall,  Francis  Corbin,  and  the  Rev. 
John  Buchanan,  all  intimately  acquainted  with  Patrick 
Henry,  left  written  testimony  as  to  the  accuracy  of  the 
Sully  picture.  Hence  this  painting  goes  down  in  history 
as  the  true  likeness.  The  Aylett  head,  the  clay  bust,  and 
the  statue  by  Crawford  in  the  Capitol  Square  group 
at  Richmond  *  set  forth  the  lineaments  thus  preserved. 

Both  the  Sully  portrait  and  a  profile  sketch  made  by 
B.  H.  Latrobe  refer  to  a  much  later  period  in  Henry's 
life  than  the  middle  one  now  under  consideration;  not 
only  so,  but  most  of  the  old-time  writers  tell  of  him 

*  The  Richmond  group  by  Thomas  Crawford  shows  Washing 
ton  on  horseback  in  the  centre,  overtopping  all.  From  the 
plinth  on  which  this  statue  stands  extend  the  five  rays  of  a 
star,  each  ray  bearing  a  statue  of  a  distinguished  Virginian. 
One  of  these  bronze  figures  represents  Henry  in  the  act  of 
uttering,  "  Give  me  Liberty  or  give  me  Death."  There  is  an 
oil  painting  of  Henry  in  Independence  Hall.  In  the  Capitol  at 
Washington  is  another  notable  portrait.  Henry's  face  looks 
down  from  the  ceiling  of  the  Continental  Congress  chamber  in 
Carpenters'  Hall. 

118 


HIS  PROGRESS 

as  he  was  in  his  declining  days,  rather  than  as  he 
looked  when  in  his  prime.*  Arnold's  summary  with 
respect  to  him  is  interesting :  "  Six  feet,  slight  stoop, 
rather  spare,  dark  complexion,  grave  countenance,  eyes 
overhung  by  long  dark  lashes  and  full  eyebrows — bril 
liant,  full  of  spirit,  rapid  in  motion ;  forehead  high  and 
straight;  nose  somewhat  of  Roman  stamp."  Again  we 
read  of  Henry :  "  He  was  tall  and  spare,  but  of  limbs 
round  enough  for  either  vigor  or  grace.  He  had,  how 
ever,  a  slight  stoop,  such  as  very  thoughtful  people  are 
apt  to  contract."  And  again :  "  He  was  nearly  six  feet 
high,  spare  and  raw-boned,  with  a  slight  stoop  to  his 
shoulders." 

So  many  American  statesmen  have  been  round-shoul 
dered  that  one  is  tempted  to  speak  of  it  as  "  the  states 
man's  stoop."  Perhaps  "  the  Lincoln  stoop  "  would  con 
vey  a  more  exact  idea.  Tall  civilians,  moving  with 
caution  through  a  wicked  world  with  low  doorways  and 
few  portals  arched  in  splendor,  are  apt  to  take  care  of 
their  heads.  Spencer  Roane  mentions  the  stoop,  adding 
that  Henry  was  "  middle-sized."  Thus,  while  there  is 
no  doubt  about  the  stoop,  a  question  is  raised  as  to  the 
stature.  The  Rev.  Archibald  Alexander,  who  found  him 
"  lean  rather  than  fleshy,"  says :  "  He  was  rather  above 
than  below  the  common  height,  but  had  a  stoop  in  the 
shoulders  which  prevented  him  from  appearing  as  tall 
as  he  really  was.  In  his  moments  of  animation,  he  had 
a  habit  of  straightening  his  frame,  and  adding  to  his 
apparent  stature."  In  other  words,  only  when  Henry 
swung  himself  to  his  tiptoeing  height,  in  the  fine  frenzy 

*  The  "  Longacre  portrait "  of  Henry  is  frequently  seen. 
The  original  engraving  was  made  by  E.  Wellmore  from  a 
painting  by  J.  B.  Longacre,  after  the  Fleming  miniature.  The 
engraved  "  Chappel  portrait "  of  Henry  is  from  a  painting  by 
Alonzo  Chappel.  The  Sully  portrait  was  engraved  by  W.  S. 
Leney  in  1817. 

119 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

of  his  oratorical  enthusiasms,  did  he  reach  or  overtop 
the  six-foot  mark. 

All  agree  that  Henry's  forehead  beetled  somewhat  and 
rose  well  before  it  rounded  back,  in  a  symmetrical  curve, 
on  normal  lines.  There  was  room  enough  inside  the  head 
for  whatever  brains  a  man  might  need.  All  agree  con 
cerning  the  oval  cast  of  countenance,  the  long  nose,  and 
the  mouth.  This  was  so  shaped  as  to  strengthen  the 
masculinity  of  his  appearance — an  actor's  mouth,  or 
an  orator's;  and  his  well-kept  teeth  were  sound.  His 
lips  met  as  if  they  were  accustomed  to  the  meeting,  and 
as  if  each  knew  its  place.  The  upper  one  was  long. 
It  probably  outmeasured  the  flat  of  Henry's  razor-blade  ; 
and  when  he  used  this  same  razor  on  the  sides  of  his  face, 
it  had  plenty  of  space  to  go  over,  for  the  jawbones  were 
big.  Latrobe  makes  him  almost  lantern-jawed.  Less 
hollow  than  Lincoln's,  his  cheeks  had  an  inward  sag, 
and  he  must  have  contrasted  strangely  with  Peyton 
Randolph,  who  possessed  a  notable  pair  of  jowls.  All 
agree,  too,  concerning  Henry's  hueless  skin.  The  ruddy 
men,  as  a  rule,  lived  farther  away  from  tidewater.  But 
all  do  not  agree  as  to  the  color  of  his  eyes.  In  Judge 
St.  George  Tucker's  vivid  and  charmingly  analytical 
pen-picture  which  is  about  to  be  copied — a  description 
that  shows  us  Henry  just  as  he  was  in  his  most  virile 
days — his  eyes  are  said  to  be  gray.  Judge  Roane  assures 
us :  "  He  had  a  fine  blue  eye,  and  an  excellent  set  of 
teeth,  which,  with  the  aid  of  a  mouth  sufficiently  wide, 
enabled  him  to  articulate  very  distinctly.  His  voice  was 
strong,  harmonious,  and  clear,  and  he  could  modulate 
it  at  pleasure."  "  Go  out  on  a  perfectly  clear  day  and 
look  up  at  the  sky,"  said  his  daughter  Sarah  to  William 
Wirt  Henry,  "  and  you  will  have  an  excellent  idea  of 
the  color  of  his  eyes." 

Does  it  bring  us  down  from  the  blue  too  abruptly  to  add 
that  he  was  bald  from  early  youth,  that  his  slight  fringe 

120 


HIS  PROGRESS 

of  natural  hair  was  reddish  brown,  and  that  in  public 
he  always  wore  a  wig  ?  But,  having  taken  the  testimony 
of  those  who  knew  him  best  with  regard  to  the  color  of 
his  eyes,  we  may  come  at  once  to  the  description  by 
Tucker,  then  a  student  at  William  and  Mary  College. 
Judge  Tucker  says : 

"The  General  Court  met  in  April  [1773].  Mr.  Henry  prac 
ticed  as  a  lawyer  in  it.  I  attended  very  frequently ;  generally 
sat  near  the  clerk's  table,  directly  opposite  to  the  bar.  I  had 
now  for  the  first  time  a  near  view  of  Mr.  Henry's  face.  He 
wore  a  black  suit  of  clothes  and  (as  was  the  custom  of  the  bar 
then)  a  tie-wig,  such  as  Mr.  Pendleton  wore  till  his  death. 
His  appearance  was  greatly  improved  by  these  adventitious 
circumstances.  His  visage  was  long,  thin,  but  not  sharp,  dark, 
without  any  appearance  of  blood  in  his  cheeks,  somewhat 
inclining  to  sallowness;  his  profile  was  of  the  Roman  cast, 
though  his  nose  was  rather  long  than  high,  his  forehead  high 
and  straight,  but  forming  a  considerable  angle  with  the  nose ; 
his  eyebrows  dark,  long,  and  full;  his  eyes  a  dark  gray,  not 
large,  penetrating,  deep-set  in  his  head ;  his  eyelashes  long  and 
black,  which,  with  the  color  of  his  eyebrows,  made  his  eyes 
appear  almost  black;  a  superficial  view  would  indeed  make  it 
be  supposed  they  were  perfectly  black ;  his  nose  was  of  the 
Roman  stamp,  as  I  have  said;  his  cheekbones  rather  high,  but 
not  like  a  Scots-man's ;  they  were  neither  as  large,  as  near  the 
eyes,  nor  as  far  apart  as  [are  those  of]  the  natives  of  Scotland ; 
his  cheeks  hollow ;  his  chin  long  but  well-formed,  and  rounded 
at  the  end,  so  as  to  form  a  proper  counterpart  to  the  upper 
part  of  the  face.  I  find  it  difficult  to  describe  his  mouth,  in 
which  there  was  nothing  remarkable,  except  when  about  to 
express  a  modest  dissent  from  some  opinion  upon  which  he 
was  commenting;  he  then  had  a  half  sort  of  smile,  in  which 
the  want  of  conviction  was,  perhaps,  more  strongly  expressed 
than  that  cynical  or  satirical  emotion  which  probably  prompted 
it.  His  manner  and  address  to  the  court  and  jury  might  be 
deemed  the  excess  of  humility,  diffidence,  and  modesty.  If,  as 
rarely  happened,  he  had  occasion  to  answer  any  remark  from 
the  bench,  it  was  impossible  for  meekness  herself  to  assume  a 
manner  less  presumptuous,  but  in  the  smile,  of  which  I  have 
been  speaking,  you  might  anticipate  the  want  of  conviction 
expressed  in  his  answers,  at  the  moment  that  he  submitted  to 

121 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

the  '  superior  wisdom '  of  the  court,  with  a  grace  that  would 
have  done  honour  to  the  most  polished  courtier  in  Westminster 
Hall. 

"  In  his  reply  to  counsel,  his  remarks  on  the  evidence  and  on 
the  conduct  of  the  parties,  he  preserved  the  same  distinguished 
deference  and  politeness,  still  accompanied  by  the  never-failing 
index  of  this  sceptical  smile  when  the  occasion  prompted.  His 
manner  was  solemn  and  impressive ;  his  voice  neither  remark 
able  for  its  pleasing  tones  or  the  variety  of  its  cadence,  nor  for 
harshness.  If  it  was  never  melodious  (as  I  think),  it  was 
never,  however,  raised  harsh.  It  was  clear,  distinct,  and  capable 
of  that  emphasis  which  I  incline  to  believe  constituted  one  of 
the  greatest  charms  in  Mr.  Henry's  manner.  His  countenance 
was  grave  (even  when  clothed  with  the  half  smile  I  have  men 
tioned),  penetrating,  and  marked  with  the  strong  lineaments  of 
deep  reflection.  When  speaking  in  public,  he  never  (even  on 
occasions  when  he  excited  it  in  others)  had  anything  like 
pleasantry  in  his  countenance,  his  manner,  or  the  tone  of  his 
voice.  You  would  swear  he  had  never  uttered  or  laughed  at  a 
joke.  In  short,  in  debate  either  at  the  bar  or  elsewhere,  his 
manner  was  so  earnest  and  impressive,  united  with  a  contrac 
tion  or  knitting  of  his  brows  which  appeared  habitual,  as  to 
give  his  countenance  a  severity  sometimes  bordering  upon  the 
appearance  of  anger  or  contempt  suppressed,  while  his  language 
and  gesture  exhibited  nothing  but  what  was  perfectly  decorous. 
He  was  emphatic,  without  vehemence  or  declamation ;  animated, 
but  never  boisterous;  nervous,  without  recourse  to  intemperate 
language;  and  clear,  though  not  always  methodical." 

This  certainly  puts  Henry  upon  his  feet  for  us,  and 
makes  him  alive  again.  One  has  no  imagination  what 
ever  if,  after  reading  Judge  Tucker's  memorabilia,  one 
cannot  get  a  sight  of  the  subject  himself.  The  sunlight 
comes  in  on  him  as  he  stands  at  the  bar  before  an  impres 
sive  bench  of  judges;  and  we  view  him  from  head  to 
foot.  There  is  particularization ;  there  is  a  categorical 
counting  of  buttons  and  buckles ;  there  is  "  long  expo 
sure,"  as  the  photographers  say,  and  all  that  one's  mind 
has  to  do  is  to  sensitize  itself,  take  the  picture,  and 
develop  it.  After  this  we  shall  at  least  feel  that  the 
Henry  of  the  bar  and  the  forum  is  fairly  well  known 

122 


THE   CLAY    BUST    OF    PATRICK    HENRY 
(Made  from  life  by  an  Italian  in  1788,  and  copied  in  bronze.) 


HIS  PROGRESS 

to  us,  even  though  we  may  doubt  our  grasp  of  him  when 
he  is  playing  other  parts.  We  shall  remember  his 
gravity,  his  earnestness,  as  betokened  by  brows  that  knit 
and  unknit,  his  deference  and  restraint,  and,  above  all, 
we  shall  bear  in  mind  his  demurring  smile,  which  con 
veyed  with  delicacy  and  instantaneous  effect  much  that 
could  not  be  safely  trusted  to  words. 

Judge  Tucker's  reference  to  Henry's  voice  leaves  us  in 
doubt  as  to  whether  it  were  melodious  or  otherwise. 
It  was  never  harsh,  but  "  not  remarkable  for  its  pleasing 
tones."  Henry  varied  his  manner  to  meet  his  audience 
and  impress  his  contention.  One  of  the  earliest  writers 
to  present  him  in  a  realistic  way,  outlining  him  with 
exactitude,  said,  in  the  Southern  Literary  Messenger, 
August,  1847: 

"  He  was  gifted  with  a  strong  and  musical  voice,  often  ren 
dered  doubly  fascinating  by  the  mild  splendors  of  his  brilliant 
blue  eyes.  When  animated,  he  spoke  with  the  greatest  variety 
of  manner  and  tone.  It  was  necessary  to  involve  him  in  some 
great  emergency  in  order  to  arouse  his  more  sterling  qualities, 
and  then,  to  the  surprise  of  himself  as  well  as  everybody  else, 
he  would  in  the  most  splendid  manner  develop 

" '  A  treasure  all  undreamt  of :  as  the  night 
Calls  out  the  harmonies  of  streams  that  roll 
Unheard  by  day.' 

"  He  was  careless  in  dress,  and  sometimes  intentionally  and 
extravagantly  awkward  in  movement ;  but  always,  like  the  phos 
phorescent  stone  at  Bologna,  he  was  less  rude  than  glowing.  He 
could  be  vehement,  insinuating,  humorous,  and  sarcastic  by 
turns ;  and  to  every  sort  of  style  he  gave  the  highest  effect." 

"  He  wore  coarse  apparel  " — "  his  leather  breeches 
were,  greasy  " — "  he  was  careless  in  dress."  There  are 
so  many  insinuations  that  Henry  was  unappreciative  of 
the  colonial  tailor  as  to  warrant  us  in  flaunting  forth  a 
contradictory  fact.  At  this  very  time  he  wore  a  peach 
es 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

blossom  colored  coat  in  the  streets  of  Williamsburg. 
"  When  I  first  saw  Mr.  Henry,"  says  Judge  Tucker, 
"  which  was  in  March,  1/73,  he  wore  a  peach-blossom 
colored  coat,  and  a  dark  wig  which  tied  behind,  and  I 
believe  [had]  a  bag  to  it,  as  was  the  fashion  of  the  day." 
But  it  may  be  recalled  in  this  connection  that  the 
colonial  gentry  were  accustomed  to  adorn  themselves 
with  fine  raiment.  In  Boston  John  Hancock  habitually 
wore  a  scarlet  coat  of  velvet,  with  velvet  ruffles  on  the 
sleeves.  General  Gage  grimly  suggested  that  by  and  by 
the  -fashion  in  Hancock's  case  would  change  to  iron 
ruffles. 

"  As  for  their  king,  John  Hancock, 

And  Adams,  if  they're  taken, 
Their  heads  for  signs  shall  hang  up  high 
Upon  the  hill  called  Beacon." 

With  regard  to  Henry  and  dress,  the  simple  fact  is 
that  at  this  period  he  was  seeking  to  overcome  his  negli 
gence  and  to  adjust  himself  to  his  surroundings.  "  Sartor 
Resartus  "  was  yet  to  be  written ;  but  he  probably  had 
thought  a  little  for  himself  on  the  subject  of  shoemakers 
and  tailors.  Year  by  year  he  was  widening  his  field  of 
activity,  and  sound  common-sense  told  him  that  he  must 
conform  to  the  usages  of  society.  We  are  told  that  at 
the  bar  "  he  wore  a  full  suit  of  black  cloth  or  velvet,  and 
a  tie-wig,  which  was  dressed  and  powdered  in  the  first 
style  of  forensic  fashion."  In  winter  he  shielded  him 
self  with  a  cloak  of  scarlet  cloth.  The  Sully  portrait 
shows  him  in  black,  with  a  white  cravat.  Over  his 
shoulders  is  a  red  velvet  mantle.  This  was  "  his  usual 
dress  while  in  the  Legislature." 

Henry  was  a  water-drinker.  He  was  temperate  in 
eating.  He  never  swore — not  even  at  the  King.  All 
his  habits  were  simple,  from  youth  to  old  age.  "  In  his 
friendships,"  says  Captain  George  Dabney,  "he  was 

124 


HIS  PROGRESS 

sincere."  He  was  of  "  a  cheerful  disposition,  and  an 
agreeable  companion."  He  had  "  a  great  respect  for  the 
Christian  religion."  John  Bright's  grandmother,  Rachel 
Wilson,  of  the  Society  of  Friends,  wrote  in  the  diary  of 
her  Virginia  travels,  under  date  of  Williamsburg,  March 
31,  1769:  "We  returned  that  night  to  Francis  Clark's. 
Called  by  the  way  to  see  one  of  the  Assemblymen,  who 
was  a  man  of  great  moderation;  his  name  was  Patrick 
Henry.  He  received  us  with  great  civility,  and  made 
some  sensible  remarks.  We  had  an  open  time  in  the 
family." 

Henry's  relation  with  the  Quakers  was  notably  frank 
and  sympathetic.  Presently  we  shall  see  how  free  he 
was  to  open  his  mind  to  them  on  a  subject  that  dis 
tressed  him.  But,  more  than  any  other  sect,  the  Baptists 
won  his  attention  at  this  particular  time.  Robert  B. 
Semple,  in  his  "  History  of  the  Baptists  in  Virginia," 
tells  of  the  tribulations  of  various  ministers  of  that 
church  who  were  sent  to  jail  as  "  disturbers  of  the 
peace."  They  were  bold  in  their  demand  for  freedom 
of  speech  and  persistent  in  their  attempts  to  secure  it. 
4<  It  was  in  making  these  attempts,"  says  Semple,  "  that 
they  were  so  fortunate  as  to  interest  in  their  behalf  the 
celebrated  Patrick  Henry;  being  always  a  friend  of 
liberty,  he  only  needed  to  be  informed  of  their  oppres 
sion  ;  without  hesitation,  he  stepped  forward  to  their 
relief.  From  that  time  until  the  day  of  their  complete 
emancipation  from  the  shackles  of  tyranny,  the  Baptists 
found  in  Patrick  Henry  an  unwavering  friend.  May 
his  name  descend  to  posterity  with  unsullied  honor!  "  * 

*  Foote,  in  his  "  Virginia  Sketches,"  tells  of  certain  Baptists 
who  preached  through  the  prison  bars  at  Fredericksburg.  At 
their  trial,  the  prosecutor  declared :  "  They  cannot  meet  a  man 
upon  the  road  but  they  must  ram  a  text  of  Scripture  down  his 
throat."  Foote  says  that  Patrick  Henry  rode  fifty  miles  to 
volunteer  his  services  in  behalf  of  the  Baptists.  A  dramatic 

125 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

So  interested  did  Henry  become  in  this  work  that  he 
paid  out  of  his  own  pocket  the  jail  fees  of  the  Rev. 
John  Weather  ford,  whose  release  in  Chesterfield  County 
had  been  secured  through  his  agency.  Not  for  twenty 
years  did  this  clergyman  know  thai  Henry  had  been  his 
good  angel. 

scene  is  described,  and  a  part  of  .->  sp-.^ch  attributed  to  Henry 
has  been  much  quoted ;  but  there  is  reason  to  believe  that  Henry 
did  not  make  the  speech.  A  con  on  the  subject  arose 

in  1871,  Horatio  Gates  Jones  defe'i-jinw:  and  the  editor  of  the 
Richmond  Religious  Herald  assailing  the  authenticity  of  the 
printed  version. 


126 


VII 

EARLY    LEADERSHIP CONTRAST    AND    COMPARISON 

HAVING  drawn  as  near  to  Henry's  person  as  au 
thenticated  facts  permit,  we  come  again  to  that  part  of 
his  public  life  immediately  antedating  the  Revolution. 
It  was  a  glorious  period  for  him.  In  those  days  edu 
cated  people  slipped  into  the  classics  with  facility  and 
frequency;  so  Henry's  oratory  was  likened  to  that  of 
the  greatest  of  the  Greeks.  There  is  no  offence  when 
Byron,  in  "  The  Age  of  Bronze,"  raptly  sings  of  him 
as  ik  the  forest-born  Demosthenes " ;  but  then,  Byron 
was  taking  no  more  than  the  poet's  license.  For  critical 
purposes,  will  it  not  be  less  incongruous  if,  catching 
Edmund  Randolph's  cue,  we  contrast  him  with  a  certain 
great  English  orator  of  his  own  generation ;  and  will  it 
not  be  still  more  to  the  point  if,  after  that,  we  compare 
him  with  a  certain  maltster  who  labored  in  the  patriot 
cause  elsewhere  in  America?  One  cannot  well  survey 
the  life  and  times  of  Patrick  Henry  without  also  seeing 
the  potential  figures  of  William  Pitt  and  Samuel 
Adams. 

But,  before  bringing  on  these  worthies,  it  will  make 
for  coherence  if  we  set  forth  in  short  order  a  few  facts 
that  are  essential  to  a  clear  understanding  of  Henry's 
life.  It  should  be  said  that  he  was  a  Burgess  from 
1765  until  the  ancient  Assembly  practically  ceased  to 
exist;  that  he  became  the  leader  of  the  popular  party, 
in  opposition  to  Edmund  Pendleton,  when,  in  a  fierce 
contest,  Richard  Henry  Lee's  bill  separating  the  offices 
of  Speaker  and  Treasurer  was  forced  through  the 
House ;  that  thereafter  Lee  was  Patrick  Henry's  friend, 
and  Pendleton  by  no  means  such ;  and  that  the  animosi- 

127 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

ties  then  engendered  lingered  so  long  as  to  tincture 
adversely  various  estimates  of  Henry,  even  after  his 
death. 

Let  us  make  no  mistake  as  to  the  character  of  the 
House  of  Burgesses,  or  misconceive  the  scope  and 
quality  of  Henry's  leadership.  Until  within  a  year  past 
the  Journals  of  the  House  were  incomplete,  but  they 
are  no  longer  so.  The  volumes  for  1766,  1767,  and 
1768,  which  were  missing,  have  been  found  in  the  Brit 
ish  Public  Record  Office,  and  transcribed  for  the  Vir 
ginia  State  Library.  Therefore  a  Henry  student  may 
follow  the  proceedings  of  the  colonial  legislators,  day 
by  day,  from  Stamp  Act  times  until  the  outbreak  of 
the  Revolutionary  War.  Such  a  student  will  find  a 
great  deal  to  impress  him.  He  certainly  will  find 
"  atmosphere."  The  House  was  ceremonious  and  dig 
nified,  but  like  the  elephant  in  the  fable,  it  could  pick 
up  a  pin.  It  could  teach  the  King  of  England  his  busi 
ness,  or  order  that  no  member  should  "  chew  tobacco 
while  the  Speaker  was  in  the  chair."  It  could  congrat 
ulate  mankind  upon  the  birth  of  the  Princess  Sophia, 
or  listen  appreciatively  to  an  account  of  some  such 
political  brawl  as  that  between  High  Sheriff  Hoskins 
of  Halifax  and  Candidate  Terry.  Colonel  Terry  appears 
to  have  given  the  House  more  trouble  than  anybody 
else  except  George  the  Third.  Terry  was  a  colonial 
"  fire-eater."  An  election  was  going  on  in  Halifax 
County,  and  he  reached  the  ground,  "  stripped  for  a 
fight,  with  his  cane  in  his  hand."  Then: 


"  The  said  Hoskins  came  up  to  the  door,  when  the  said  Terry 
said  to  him,  '  Damn  you !  Will  you  use  me  ill  ?  '  Or  words  to 
that  purpose.  To  which  Hoskins  replied,  '  I  intend  to  use  no 
man  ill.'  Terry  then  said  he  had  no  clerk,  but  should  have  one 
in  a  little  time  [to  take  the  poll] ;  and  asked  Hoskins  if  he  was 
determined  to  read  the  writ  [to  open  the  polls  earlier  than 
usual].  Hoskins  replied,  'I  am.'  Upon  which  the  said  Terry 

128 


EARLY  LEADERSHIP 

declared  if  he  did,  he  would  be  damned  if  he  did  not  cane  him. 
'  Why,  then,'  said  Hoskins,  '  I  will  be  damned  if  I  don't ;  and 
cane  away ! '  .  .  .  Upon  which  the  said  Terry  moved  one  hand 
towards  the  Writ  and  raised  his  Stick  with  the  other,  which 
was  caught  by  Moses  Terry." 

But  this  extract  from  the  Journal  covers  a  mere 
incident — a  triviality,  introduced  here  to  show  that  the 
Burgesses  had  a  world  of  their  own  around  them,  and 
that  Henry,  as  a  part  of  this  world,  gave  his  mind  to  a 
thousand  and  one  matters  not  at  all  connected  with 
the  great  storm  then  brewing.  The  Journals  bear  evi 
dence  that  his  work  in  committee  was  important  and 
well  done.  It  is  clear  that  he  was  always  ready,  with 
his  "  acute  common  sense,"  to  suggest  and  supervise. 
Let  it  not  be  assumed,  however,  that  he  overshadowed 
his  fellow-members  of  the  House  of  Burgesses,  which 
was  a  business  body,  and  which  contained  men  who 
regarded  themselves  as  his  superiors.  Indeed,  in  speak 
ing  of  Henry  as  a  "  leader,"  it  is  not  meant  that  he 
prescribed  policies  or  managed  a  pack  of  followers  in 
the  manner  of  a  modern  "  boss."  Far  from  it.  He 
regarded  himself  as  personally  responsible  to  the  free 
men  of  Hanover  for  whatever  he  did  in  their  name. 
It  was  customary  for  the  electors  to  meet  at  the  Court 
house  on  a  set  day,  and  it  was  incumbent  upon  the 
Burgesses  of  that  county  to  attend,  and,  if  necessary, 
to  answer  the  questions  of  the  people.  Any  man  who 
had  a  vote  felt  that  it  was  his  privilege  to  shake  a  cate 
chising  finger  at  his  representative.  If  Patrick  Henry 
had  been  a  negligent,  or  corrupt,  or  otherwise  faithless 
official,  he  would  have  been  denounced  from  the  stump 
on  the  Court-house  green.  It  would  have  been  obliga 
tory  upon  him  to  defend  himself  then  and  there.  The 
electorate  had  high  regard  for  Henry,  but  they  were 
not  subservient  to  him  or  afraid  of  him.  Any  one  of 
a  hundred  men  could  and  would  have  arraigned  him  if 
9  129 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

he  had  done  Virginia  a  disservice.  All  public  men, 
at  a  somewhat  later  period,  when  true  democracy  had 
triumphed,  were  accountable  to  the  public  in  face-to- 
face  testimony,  debate,  and  ruling.  Perhaps  it  was  this 
sense  of  personal  responsibility  that  made  statesmen 
grow  great  in  Henry's  day. 

Keenly  interested  in  the  frontier,  Henry  served  on 
the  Indian  and  Boundary  committees,  and  actually 
journeyed  to  New  York,  with  Richard  Bland,  in  the 
hope  of  bettering  the  regulations  of  the  Indian  trade. 
Fauquier  was  now  dead,  and  the  kind  and  courtly 
Botetourt  was  acting  towards  the  Virginians  in  a  spirit 
such  as  Pitt  himself  might  have  shown,  had  he  fled  to 
so  small  a  capital  as  Williamsburg  in  order  to  escape 
the  agonies  of  government,  if  not  those  of  gout. 

For  gout  had  gone  to  William  Pitt's  head,  and  played 
havoc  there.  He  was  Lord  Chatham  now,  and  not 
himself  at  all.  To  the  King,  he  was  still  "  that  perfid 
ious  man  " ;  yet  the  British  world  was  distempered,  and 
his  Majesty  had  sent  for  him  as  successor  to  the  Mar 
quis  of  Rockingham.  Therefore  he  was  Prime  Min 
ister,  but  only  so  in  name.  In  seeking  to  prevent  a 
rupture  with  America,  he  had  to  contend  against  the 
ignorance  of  the  British  governing  class,  a  venal  Par 
liament,  and  the  blind  rancor  of  the  King.  As  in  Wai- 
pole's  time,  this  venal  Parliament  could  show  "  rows 
of  ponderous  fox-hunters,  fat  with  Staffordshire  or 
Devonshire  ale."  Chatham  hid  in  the  country. 
"  Junius  "  called  him  a  "  lunatic."  Lecky  says  of  him : 
"  Of  all  great  Englishmen  he  is  perhaps  the  one  in 
whom  there  was  the  largest  admixture  of  the  qualities 
of  the  charlatan."  But  Americans,  excusing  his  arti 
ficialities  and  his  insincerities,  find  it  against  the  grain 
to  so  regard  him.  They  cannot  but  think  of  him  as 
a  friend.  They  feel  that  he  was  betrayed  by  Charles 
Townshend,  the  witty  and  eloquent  poseur,  who 

130 


EARLY  LEADERSHIP 

"  shifted  his  politics  with  every  new  moon  " ;  who  made 
"  champagne  speeches,"  crying,  "  England  is  undone 
if  this  taxation  is  given  up,"  and  who  took  advantage 
of  a  time  when  Chatham's  mind  was  unhinged  to  lay 
an  import  tax  on  America's  wine,  oil,  fruits,  glass, 
paper,  lead,  painters'  colors,  and  tea — thereby  pleasing 
the  King,  but  risking  wreck  for  a  glorious  empire.  It 
may  be  that  Chatham  was  really  out  of  his  senses  at 
this  time.  He  played  potentate ;  he  bought  and  tore 
down  neighboring  houses,  so  that  he  could  live  in  seclu 
sion  ;  he  kept  chickens  on  the  grill  night  and  day,  lest 
by  and  by  his  appetite  and  his  wits  should  of  a  sudden 
return.  His  wits  did  return,  and  he  labored  like  a  giant 
for  America.  Only  with  his  dramatic  (or,  perhaps 
we  should  say,  melodramatic)  death  did  he  cease  to 
thunder  against  "  the  dismemberment  of  this  ancient 
and  most  noble  monarchy." 

Somehow,  we  seem  to  correct  certain  errors  in  our 
Americanized  sense  of  proportion  by  recalling  Chatham 
in  connection  with  Henry.  One  was  primitive,  plain, 
a  man  'of  the  provinces ;  the  other,  a  complex  develop 
ment  of  high-pressure  life  at  the  centre  of  English 
civilization.  One  was  simple._.and  sincere;  the  other 
cloaked  himself  constantly.  But  each  had  a  lofty  view, 
each  was  far-seeing,  each  was"  patriotic,  and  each  was 
born  to  enthrall  mankind  with  masterful  tongue.  { 

As  an  orator,  Henry  had  much  in  common  with 
Chatham,  whose  voice  was  melodious  and  whose  gesture 
and  delivery  were  superb.  Arthur  S.  McDowall  says : 
"  The  most  remarkable  characteristic  of  his  speaking 
was  its  union  of  dramatic  power  with  a  striking  moral 
ascendancy;  and  this  was  the  salient  characteristic  of 
his  life  as  well  as  oratory."  Grattan  said :  "  He  light 
ened  upon  his  subject  and  reached  the  point  by  the 
flashings  of  his  mind,  which  were  felt  but  could  not  be 
followed."  In  this,  he  was  Henry  over  again. 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

But  King  George  and  Mr.  Townshend  and  another 
man  made  Chatham's  oratory  unavailing.  Let  us  con 
sider  this  other  man — Samuel  Adams.  If  Henry  were 
the  trumpeter  of  the  Revolution,  Adams  was  beyond 
all  question  its  organizer.  As  with  Henry,  his  start 
in  life  was  such  as  to  foreshadow  failure.  His  enemies 
declared  that  he  bore  the  regal  government  a  grudge 
because  of  his  father's  misadventure  in  the  Land  Bank 
scheme.  They  attributed  a  selfish  motive  to  Otis  also, 
saying  that  he  was  revengeful,  and  that  he  never  would 
have  been  a  patriot  if  the  "  greedy  Hutchinsons  "  had 
not  snatched  the  Chief-Justiceship  from  James  Otis, 
Senior.  All  this,  of  course,  is  beside  the  mark.  Adams 
had  few  equals  in  public  spirit.  What  did  he  care  if 
his  malt-house  roof  fell  in?  He  was  poor — the  people 
clothed  him.  They  repaired  his  dwelling  for  him.  They 
put  silver  Johannes  into  his  pocket  because  they  knew 
he  was  working  for  them  and  could  not  be  bribed. 
Some  believe  that  our  American  word  "  caucus  "  first 
issued,  not  from  the  throat  of  a  crow,  but  from  the 
mouth  of  a  patriotic  Bostonian  who  was  trying  to  say 
"Caulkers'  Club."  Adams  agitated  among  the  caulk 
ers  and  rope-makers  and  organized  the  Caulkers'  Club, 
just  as  he  organized  everything  else.  If  not  the  first 
American  politician,  he  was  the  first  genius  in  Amer 
ican  politics.  Governor  Hutchinson — a  forceful  man, 
a  great  man,  indeed — soon  called  Adams  "  the  chief 
incendiary  of  the  province."  Daniel  Leonard,  loyalist, 
denounced  his  plan  to  knit  together  the  town-meetings 
of  Massachusetts  as  "  the  foulest,  subtlest,  and  most 
venomous  serpent  ever  issued  from  the  egg  of  sedition." 
Adams,  says  Bancroft,  was  "  the  helmsman  of  the  Revo 
lution  at  its  origin,  the  truest  representative  of  the 
home  rule  of  Massachusetts  in  its  town-meetings  and 
General  Court."  He  not  only  schemed  like  a  politi 
cian,  but  planned  like  a  statesman,  and  grew  in  boldness 

132 


EARLY  LEADERSHIP 

and  practicality  with  the  growth  of  his  own  great  work. 
It  is  rarely  that  a  man  is  both  strategist  and  zealot,  as 
Samuel  Adams  was.  So  shrewd  was  he  that  one  might 
imagine  him  cold  by  nature;  but  how  warm  a  heart 
he  had  for  his  fellow-men  is  attested  in  his  sacrifices 
and  labors.  When  we  compare  Adams  with  Henry, 
we  find  that  each  was  virile,  sagacious,  comprehensive 
in  mental  grasp,  and  animated  by  the  spirit  of  democ 
racy.  Let  this  spirit  become  debased,  and  it  is  of  slight 
worth ;  but  when  first  welcomed  in  an  imaginative  mind, 
no  theoretical  conception  has  truer  human  warmth 
and  beauty.  It  operates  to  expel  from  one  caste  self 
ishness,  pride,  and  even  that  imp  which  clings  closest  to 
us — greed.  It  humanizes,  fraternizes,  puts  a  large  phil 
anthropy  into  our  politics.  It  reverses  the  line :  "  His 
hand  will  be  against  every  man,  and  every  man's  hand 
against  him."  Ishmael  dies,  and  with  him  we  bury  a 
selfish  civilization.  Such  is  the  idea  of  democracy  in  its 
first  glow,  and  there  is  no  doubt  that  there  were 
moments  when  both  Adams  and  Henry  were  influenced 
by  it. 

But,  while  alike  in  certain  of  the  larger  qualities,  the 
two  differed  greatly  in  environment  as  well  as  in  indi 
vidual  traits.  At  this  period  of  their  lives,  Adams  was 
far  beyond  Henry  in  executive  ability  and  proselyting 
skill.  Except  for  some  thousands  of  Hutchinsonians 
and  other  loyalists,  all  Massachusetts  was  at  school — 
with  Adams  as  the  teacher.  When  it  became  clear  that 
this  brewer  was  brewing  rebellion,  the  King's  anger 
fell  upon  Boston.  Troops  came.  There  was  a  massacre 
of  citizens.  With  Lord  North  on  one  side  of  the  sea 
and  General  Gage  on  the  other,  the  persistent  King 
grew  more  and  more  enamored  of  punitive  processes. 
In  course  of  time  the  port  was  shut.  The  charter  of 
the  colony  was  taken  away.  Up  and  down  the  whole 
seaboard,  the  people  watched  these  proceedings,  and 

133 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

were  filled  with  grave  concern.  They  knew  that  what 
happened  in  one  province  might  happen  in  all.  They 
had  no  stomach  for  such  coercion,  and  felt  the  unifying 
impulse  that  is  quickly  bred  under  the  menace  of  a 
general  calamity.  Not  alone  with  the  Whig  masses 
was  it  so,  but  with  men  like  John  Dickinson,  whose 
"  Letters  to  a  Pennsylvania  Farmer  "  appealed  to  the 
intellect  rather  than  to  the  passions. 

Dickinson  it  was  who  wrote  to  Richard  Henry  Lee: 
"  Virginia,  sir,  has  maintained  the  common  cause,  with 
such  attention,  spirit,  and  temper  as  has  gained  her  the 
highest  degree  of  reputation  among  the  other  colonies. 
It  is  as  much  in  her  power  to  dishearten  them  as  to 
encourage  them."  While  there  was  far  less  of  ferment 
in  Virginia  than  in  Massachusetts,  and  no  bloodshed 
whatever,  the  spirit  aroused  by  Henry  was  consistently 
maintained.  This,  too,  in  face  of  the  fact  that  Nor- 
borne  Berkeley,  Baron  de  Botetourt,  labored  with 
delicacy,  sympathy,  and  all  those  winning  arts  of  which 
he  was  master  to  coax  the  Virginians  back  the  way 
they  had  come.  His  purpose  was  to  hold  the  colony 
aloof  from  her  seditious  sisters.  Fine  lindens  shaded 
the  grounds  around  his  "  palace  "  at  Williamsburg,  and 
fine  companies  gathered  there,  as  well  as  in  the  spacious 
reception-room  hung  with  portraits  of  the  King  and 
Queen.  Tactful  he  was,  and,  better  still,  sincere — well 
worthy  of  the  noble  statue  erected  in  his  honor  by  those 
whom  he  vainly  sought  to  hold  to  an  allegiance  they 
were  prone  to  forswear.  For  Botetourt  failed.  He 
could  not  undo  Henry's  work.  Every  year  some  fresh 
event  rearoused  the  people.  When  the  King  wished 
to  deport  his  "  traitors  "  for  trial  in  England,  the  House 
of  Burgesses  uttered  a  protest.  Washington,  working 
with  George  Mason,  proposed  that  Americans  should 
organize  general  non-importation  societies;  and  this 
was  done  with  effect.  Massachusetts  was  applauded 

134 


EARLY  LEADERSHIP 

for  her  "  attention  to  liberty."  Knowing  that  they 
would  be  prorogued  for  resolving  against  the  regal 
government,  the  Burgesses  nevertheless  resolved. 
Time  and  again  they  took  up  their  hats  and  walking- 
sticks,  ascended  to  the  Council  Chamber  above  stairs 
in  the  Capitol,  and  received  the  rebukeful  message  that 
sent  them  to  their  homes.  But  they  did  not  always 
go  straight  home.  It  suited  them  at  times  to  reassemble 
in  the  "  Apollo  room  "  of  the  Raleigh  Tavern.  This 
was  a  large  frame  building  with  two  fronts.  Over  the 
main  entrance  was  a  leaden  bust  of  Sir  Walter  Raleigh 
The  "  Apollo "  or  long  room  became  so  famous  as  a 
meeting-place  of  anti-government  men  that  John  Esten 
Cooke  finds  a  certain  fitness  in  calling  it  the  "  Faneuil 
Hall  of  Virginia."  As  the  quarrel  progressed,  it  grew 
to  be  a  sort  of  opposition  capitol.  Especially  was  this 
the  case  after  Botetourt's  death,  when  John  Murray, 
Earl  of  Dunmore,  became  Governor.  Botetourt  had 
been  courtly;  Dunmore,  a  pupil  of  Bute  himself,  was 
"  coarse  and  depraved."  Botetourt  had  been  in  Henry's 
way;  Dunmore  accelerated  the  work  of  the  Hanover 
"  rebel." 

For,  though  not  exactly  a  rebel  of  the  Adams  type, 
Henry  merited  the  name.  As  ex-President  Tyler  said 
to  Hugh  Blair  Grigsby :  "  John  Tyler  called  a  son  after 
Wat  Tyler.  On  one  occasion  when  Patrick  Henry  vis 
ited  Mr.  Tyler,  between  whom  and  Henry  there  existed 
a  long  and  intimate  friendship,  terminated  only  by  the 
death  of  the  latter,  he  saw  the  infant  on  the  lap  of  his 
mother  and  asked  his  name.  '  He  is  called,  Colonel 
Henry,  after  the  two  greatest  rebels  in  English  his 
tory.'  '  Pray,  madam,  who  were  they?'  '  Wat  Tyler 
and  Patrick  Henry.'  The  name  of  the  boy  was  Walter 
Henry  Tyler."  But,  rebel  though  he  was,  it  should  not 
be  inferred  that  Henry  was  lacking  in  the  qualities 
of  patience  and  circumspection.  No  man  knew  better 

135 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

than  he  when  to  strike  and  when  to  stay  his  hand. 
"  No  man  ever  knew  men  better,  singly  or  in  mass," 
says  the  author  of  "  Homes  of  American  Statesmen  " ; 
"  none  ever  better  knew  how  to  sway  them ;  but  none 
ever  less  abused  that  power ;  for  he  seems  ever  to  have 
felt,  with  a  religious  force,  the  solemnity  of  all  those 
public  functions  which  so  few  now  regard."  "  It  was 
to  him,"  said  Thomas  Jefferson  to  Daniel  Webster, 
"  that  we  were  indebted  for  the  unanimity  that  pre 
vailed  among  us."  There  is  other  direct  evidence  to 
this  effect  in  the  matter  of  Henry's  long  leadership 
prior  to  the  clash  of  arms. 

But  we  do  ourselves  a  manifest  disservice  if  we  so 
shut  our  minds  as  to  see  Henry  only  in  those  acts  and 
attitudes  which  happened  to  be  noted  by  his  neigh 
bors,  friends,  or  rivals.  The  documentary  cue  is  essen 
tial;  but,  given  cues  enough,  we  may  reenflesh  the 
man.  Shall  he  come  out  from  behind  the  curtain  and 
bow  to  us  only  when  Judge  Tyler,  or  Mr.  Jefferson,  or 
some  other  contemporary  can  be  persuaded  to  mention 
him  ?  Rather  let  us  assume  that  he  was  abroad  on  many 
a  bright  day  and  many  a  stormy  one ;  that  his  horse 
knew  other  roads  than  the  road  from  Hanover  to  the 
Capitol,  and  that  in  his  rides  from  county  court  to 
county  court  he  was  not  averse  to  the  use  of  his  tongue 
in  the  patriot  cause.  In  other  words,  we  are  justified 
in  assuming  that  Henry  made  speeches  of  which  no 
records  survive.  The  Virginia  thunder-storm  comes 
up,  sweeps  the  land,  passes,  and  is  forgotten  save  for 
the  freshening  of  the  corn  glistening  under  the  sun. 
So  Henry,  speaking  at  some  remote  cross-roads, 
whither  he  had  journeyed  in  his  circuit,  may  have 
thundered  against  the  King,  though  no  echo  of  his 
words  has  reached  us.  Occasionally  one  finds  some 
such  Williamsburg  incident  as  this,  related  by  Major 
Scott  to  Judge  Roane :  "  Mr.  Henry  was  declaiming 

136 


EARLY  LEADERSHIP 

against  the  British  King  and  ministry,  and  such  was 
the  effect  of  his  eloquence  that  all  at  once  the  specta 
tors  in  the  gallery  rushed  out.  It  was  at  first  supposed 
that  the  house  was  on  fire.  Not  so.  But  some  of  the 
more  prominent  of  these  spectators  ran  up  into  the 
cupola  and  dowsed  the  royal  flag  which  was  there  sus 
pended!" 

This  must  have  been  during  the  exciting  Dunmore 
days,  to  which  period  Jefferson  refers  when  he  says : 

"  Subsequent  events  favored  the  bolder  spirits  of  Henry,  the 
Lees,  Pages,  Mason,  etc.,  with  whom  I  went  in  all  points.  Sen 
sible,  however,  of  the  importance  of  unanimity  among  our  con 
stituents,  although  we  wished  to  have  gone  faster,  we  slackened 
our  pace,  that  our  less  ardent  colleagues  [Pendleton,  Wythe, 
Bland,  Randolph,  and  Nicholas]  might  keep  up  with  us;  and 
they,  on  their  part,  differing  nothing  from  us  in  principle,  quick 
ened  their  gait  somewhat  beyond  that  which  their  prudence 
might  of  itself  have  advised,  and  thus  consolidated  the  phalanx 
which  breasted  the  power  of  Britain.  By  this  harmony  of  the 
bold  with  the  cautious,  we  advanced  with  our  constituents  in 
undivided  mass,  and  with  fewer  examples  of  separation  than, 
perhaps,  existed  in  any  other  part  of  the  Union." 

Jefferson  is  justified  in  using  "  we  "  when  he  thus 
testifies  concerning  the  events  of  one  century  for  the 
enlightenment  of  the  children  of  another  century.  We 
are  to  assume  that  he  meant  to  impart  the  truth ;  but, 
to  get  at  the  real  truth,  it  is  essential  to  bear  in  mind 
that  he  was  an  old  man  and  likewise  a  veteran  in 
embittered  controversies  when  he  wrote  the  foregoing 
and  following  reminiscences.  After  he  had  presented 
to  the  world  that  document  so  precious  to  Americans, 
his  life  was  one  continued  course  of  experimental 
republicanism.  He  gave  and  received  hard  blows.  He 
passed  through  so  much  that  his  sight  was  by  no  means 
so  clear  or  his  nature  so  generous  as  when  he  had 
danced  with  his  Belinda  in  the  Raleigh's  "  Apollo,"  or 

137 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

a  little  later  sat  with  Henry  there,  planning  to  outwit 
the  King.  Henry  was  Jefferson's  senior  by  seven 
years;  Henry  had  long  led  the  Assembly  and  the 
people ;  Henry  it  was  whom  Dunmore  regarded  as  the 
chief  marplot  of  the  colony.  According  to  William 
Cabell  Rives,  Dunmore  and  Henry  were  mutually  afraid 
of  each  other.  At  any  rate,  Henry  was  the  head  and 
front  of  disaffection.  We  may  question,  therefore, 
whether  he  did  not  loom  larger  to  young  Thomas 
Jefferson  in  1773  than  to  the  reminiscent  great  man  in 
1814.  There  is  an  amusing  passage  in  Jefferson's 
"  Autobiography "  with  respect  to  his  "  Summary 
View  of  the  Rights  of  British  America."  Being  ill, 
he  had  sent  a  copy  of  it  to  Henry.  "  Whether  Mr. 
Henry  disapproved  the  ground  taken,  or  was  too  lazy 
to  read  it  (for  he  was  the  laziest  man  in  reading  I 
ever  knew),  I  never  learned:  but  he  communicated  it  to 
nobody."  *  Possibly  Henry  was  preoccupied ;  possibly 
he  had  a  reason  for  his  neglect;  but  the  passage  as  it 
stands  serves  to  shed  light  upon  Jefferson's  own  char 
acter  rather  than  Henry's.  When  Jefferson  speaks  of 
Henry,  it  is  well  to  remember  the  marked  dissimilarity 
of  their  mental  habits,  their  moral  tone,  and  their 
general  outlook  upon  a  world  big  enough  for  them  both. 
Certainly  the  "  Apollo  "  was  big  enough  for  them 
both,  and  big  enough  to  hold  their  many  associates — 
among  them  Dabney  Carr,  who  had  married  Jefferson's 
sister  Martha.  Young  Carr  was  so  able,  so  brilliant, 
so  zealous,  that  he  undoubtedly  would  have  won  fame 
as  a  founder  of  the  nation  had  he  not  died  in  the  morn 
ing  of  his  day.  Let  Jefferson  tell  his  story  here,  since 
it  brings  in  Henry  too.  The  times,  it  should  be  remem 
bered,  were  "  tea-party  "  times — those  enlivening  times 

*  Jefferson  elsewhere  writes  :  "  Mr.  Henry  probably  thought 
it  too  bold,  as  a  first  measure,  as  the  majority  of  the  mem 
bers  did." 

138 


THE   RALEIGH    TAVERN,    WILLIAMSBURG 

(Here,  May  18,  1769,  May  27,  1774,  and  August,  1774,  members  of  the  House  of 
Burgesses  entered  into  associations  against  the  importation  or  purchase  of  British 
manufactures.  Drawn  from  an  old  print.) 


THE    OLD    CAPITOL,    WILLIAMSBURG 
(  Built  1705,  burned  1746  ;  rebuilt,  and  again  burned  1832.     Drawn  from  an  old  print.) 


EARLY  LEADERSHIP 

when  liberty-poles  were  put  up  and  cut  down  and  put 
up  again,  and  the  colonists  drank  tea  "  made  of  dried 
mullein,  catnip,  balm,  sage,  and  raspberry  leaves."  But 
one  of  Governor  Spotswood's  daughters  (Mrs.  Ber 
nard  Moore,  of  Chelsea),  it  is  said,  "  continued  to  sip 
her  tea  in  the  closet  after  it  was  banished  from  the 
table.1'  Says  Jefferson: 

"  Not  thinking  our  old  and  leading  members  up  to  the  point 
of  forwardness  and  zeal  which  the  times  required,  Mr.  Henry, 
R.  H.  Lee,  Francis  L.  Lee,  Mr.  Carr,  and  myself  agreed  to  meet 
in  the  evening  in  a  private  room  of  the  Raleigh  to  consult  on 
the  state  of  things.  There  may  have  been  a  member  or  two 
more  I  do  not  recollect.  We  were  all  sensible  that  the  most 
urgent  of  all  measures  was  that  of  coming  to  an  understanding 
with  all  the  other  colonies  to  consider  the  British  claims  as  a 
common  cause  to  all,  and  to  produce  an  unity  of  action:  and 
for  this  purpose  that  a  committee  of  correspondence  in  each 
colony  would  be  the  best  instrument  for  intercommunication : 
and  that  their  first  measure  would  probably  be  to  propose  a 
meeting  of  deputies  from  every  colony  at  some  central  place, 
who  should  be  charged  with  the  direction  of  measures  which 
should  be  taken  by  all.  We  therefore  drew  up  the  resolutions 
which  may  be  seen  in  Wirt,  page  87.  The  consulting  members 
proposed  to  me  to  move  them,  but  I  urged  that  it  should  be 
done  by  Mr.  Carr,  my  friend  and  brother-in-law,  then  a  new 
member,  to  whom  I  wished  an  opportunity  should  be  given  of 
making  known  to  the  house  his  great  worth  and  talents.  It 
was  so  agreed;  he  moved  them,  they  were  agreed  to  nem.  con., 
and  a  committee  of  correspondence  appointed  of  whom  Peyton 
Randolph  was  chairman.  The  Governor  (then  Lord  Dunmore) 
dissolved  us,  but  the  committee  met  the  next  day,  prepared  a 
circular  letter  to  the  Speakers  of  the  other  colonies,  enclosing 
to  each  a  copy  of  the  resolutions,  and  left  it  in  charge  with  their 
chairman  to  forward  them  by  expresses." 

Such  was  the  origin  of  the  permanent  Committees 
of  Correspondence  which  opened  the  way  for  the  Con 
tinental  Congress.  Henry  was  on  the  Virginia  Com 
mittee.  At  once  the  importance  of  the  plan  was  appre 
ciated.  "  Heaven  itself  seemed  to  have  dictated  it  to 

139 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

the  noble  Virginians,"  said  the  New  Hampshire  Gazette. 
"  O  Americans,  embrace  this  plan  of  union  as  your  life ! 
It  will  work  out  your  political  salvation."  William 
Lee  wrote  from  London  that  it  "  struck  a  greater  panic 
into  the  Ministers  than  anything  that  had  taken  place 
since  the  Stamp  Act." 

Nevertheless,  in  spite  of  the  shock,  the  Ministry  did 
little  to  lessen  and  much  to  increase  the  colonial  embit- 
terment.  So  the  quarrel  was  cumulative.  A  year  of 
agitation  passed ;  and  when  the  Burgesses  reassembled 
at  Williamsburg,  on  May  5,  1774,  the  spirit  of  discord 
was  stronger  than  ever,  with  Henry,  not  Dunmore, 
master  of  the  situation.  Dunmore  had  picked  a  boun 
dary  quarrel  with  Pennsylvania.  He  had  embroiled  the 
colony  with  the  Indians.  Perhaps  he  was  plotting  a 
diversion.  If  such  were  his  purpose,  he  was  well 
thwarted,  and  that  too  in  this  very  month  of  May.  An 
historic  and  a  dramatic  month  it  was,  especially  the 
last  week,  which  was  crowded  with  events,  as  had  been 
the  last  week  in  May  nine  years  before.  Among  the 
great  Virginians  then  upon  the  scene  was  George 
Mason.  He  was  "  a  powerful  reasoner,  a  profound 
statesman,  and  a  devoted  republican."  He  writes  from 
Williamsburg,  under  date  of  May  26,  to  his  friend 
Martin  Cockburn : 


"  I  arrived  here  on  Sunday  morning  last,  but  found  every 
body's  attention  so  entirely  engrossed  by  the  Boston  affair,  that 
I  have  as  yet  done  nothing  respecting  my  charter-rights,  and,  I 
am  afraid,  shall  not  this  week. 

"  A  dissolution  of  the  House  of  Burgesses  is  generally  ex 
pected;  but  I  think  it  will  not  happen  before  the  House  has 
gone  through  the  public  business,  which  will  be  late  in  June. 

"  Whatever  resolves  or  measures  are  intended  for  the  preser 
vation  of  our  rights  and  liberties  will  be  reserved  for  the  con 
clusion  of  the  session.  Matters  of  that  sort  here  are  conducted 
and  prepared  with  a  great  deal  of  privacy,  and  by  very  few 
members,  of  whom  Patrick  Henry  is  the  principal. 

140 


EARLY  LEADERSHIP 

"  At  the  request  of  the  gentlemen  concerned,  I  have  spent  an 
evening  with  them  on  the  subject,  when  I  had  an  opportunity 
of  conversing  with  Mr.  Henry  and  knowing  his  sentiments;  as 
well  as  of  hearing  him  speak  in  the  House  since  on  different 
occasions.  He  is  by  far  the  most  powerful  speaker  I  ever  heard. 
Every  word  he  says  not  only  engages  but  commands  the  atten 
tion;  and  your  passions  are  no  longer  your  own  when  he  ad 
dresses  them.  But  his  eloquence  is  the  smallest  part  of  his 
merit.  He  is  in  my  opinion  the  first  man  on  this  continent, 
as  well  in  abilities  as  public  virtues,  and  had  he  lived  in  Rome 
about  the  time  of  the  first  Punic  war,  when  the  Roman  people 
had  arrived  at  their  meridian  glory,  and  their  virtue  not  tar 
nished,  Mr.  Henry's  talents  must  have  put  him  at  the  head  of 
that  glorious  Commonwealth." 

Good  set  terms  are  these.  "  But  his  eloquence  is  the 
smallest  part  of  his  merit."  It  is  not  extravagant  to 
assert  that  Henry  never  had  better  praise  from  any 
man  than  Mason's.  The  source  of  the  stream  is  pure ; 
and  so  it  sparkles,  and  will  continue  to  sparkle. 

Mason  was  generous;  Jefferson,  hardly  so.  Again 
it  is  he  who  takes  up  the  thread  of  Henry's  story,  inter 
weaving  it  with  his  own.  In  the  "  Memorandum  "  he 
remarks :  "  The  next  great  occasion  on  which  he 
[Henry]  signalized  himself  was  that  which  may  be 
considered  the  dawn  of  the  Revolution  in  March  [May], 
1774."  And  in  the  "Autobiography"  he  says: 

"  The  next  event  which  excited  our  sympathies  for  Massa 
chusetts  was  the  Boston  Port  bill,  by  which  that  port  was  to 
be  shut  up  on  the  ist  of  June,  1774.  This  arrived  while  we 
were  in  session  in  the  spring  of  that  year.  The  lead  in  the 
House  on  these  subjects  being  no  longer  left  to  the  old  mem 
bers,  Mr.  Henry,  R.  H.  Lee,  Fr.  L.  Lee,  three  or  four  other 
members  whom  I  do  not  recollect,  and  myself,  agreeing  that  we 
must  boldly  take  an  unequivocal  stand  in  the  line  with  Massa 
chusetts,  determined  to  meet  and  consult  on  the  proper  measures 
in  the  Council  Chamber,  for  the  benefit  of  the  library  in  that 
room.  We  were  under  conviction  of  the  necessity  of  arousing 
our  people  from  the  lethargy  into  which  they  had  fallen  as  to 
passing  events;  and  thought  that  the  appointment  of  a  day  of 

141 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

general  fasting  and  prayer  would  be  most  likely  to  call  up  and 
alarm  their  attention.  No  example  of  such  solemnity  had 
existed  since  the  days  of  our  distresses  in  the  war  of  '55,  since 
which  a  new  generation  had  grown  up.  With  the  help  therefore 
of  Rushworth,  whom  we  rummaged  over  for  the  revolutionary 
precedents  and  forms  of  the  Puritans  of  that  day,  preserved  by 
him,  we  cooked  up  a  resolution,  somewhat  modernizing  their 
phrases,  for  appointing  the  first  day  of  June,  on  which  the  Port 
bill  was  to  commence,  for  a  day  of  fasting,  humiliation,  and 
prayer,  to  implore  heaven  to  avert  from  us  the  evils  of  civil 
war,  to  inspire  us  with  firmness  in  support  of  our  rights,  and  to 
turn  the  hearts  of  the  King  and  Parliament  to  moderation  and 
justice.  To  give  greater  emphasis  to  our  proposition,  we  agreed 
to  wait  the  next  morning  on  Mr.  Nicholas,  whose  grave  and 
religious  character  was  more  in  unison  with  the  tone  of  our 
resolution,  and  to  solicit  him  to  move  it.  We  accordingly  went 
to  him  in  the  morning.  He  moved  it  the  same  day ;  the  first  of 
June  was  proposed,  and  it  passed  without  opposition.  The 
Governor  dissolved  us  as  usual.  We  retired  to  the  Apollo  as 
before,  agreed  to  an  association,  and  instructed  the  Committee 
of  Correspondence  to  propose  to  the  correspondence  committees 
of  the  other  colonies  to  appoint  deputies  to  meet  in  Congress  at 
such  place,  annually,  as  should  be  convenient  to  direct,  from  time 
to  time,  the  measures  required  by  the  general  interest ;  and  we 
declared  that  an  attack  on  any  one  colony  should  be  considered 
an  attack  on  the  whole.  This  was  in  May." 

It  was  the  2/th  of  May,  and  there  was  much  more 
excitement  at  the  Capitol  than  Jefferson's  measured 
words  imply.  True,  the  outward  aspect  of  things  was 
peaceful ;  for  in  the  hall  of  the  House,  on  the  evening 
of  the  28th,  a  ball  was  given  in  honor  of  Lady  Dunmore 
and  her  daughters ;  but  there  was  a  deep  undercurrent 
setting  towards  colonial  unity,  and,  if  need  be,  war. 
Elsewhere  on  the  continent  there  was  a  great  stir,  and 
in  other  quarters  of  it,  this  same  red-letter  week,  prop 
ositions  were  made  that  intercolonial  delegates  should 
assemble  in  a  general  Congress.  But  officially  the  Vir 
ginians  led.  Elsewhere,  also,  on  the  first  of  June  busi 
ness  was  suspended,  bells  were  tolled,  and  flags  were 
lowered  to  half  mast.  In  Virginia,  says  Jefferson,  "  the 

142 


Y  LEADERSHIP 


people  met  generally,  with  anxiety  and  alarm  in  their 
countenances,  and  the  effect  of  the  day  thro'  the  whole 
colony  was  like  a  shock  of  electricity,  arousing  every 
man  and  placing  him  erect  and  solidly  on  his  centre. 
They  chose  universally  delegates  for  the  convention." 

To  this  convention,  which  sat  in  Williamsburg  during 
the  first  six  days  in  August,  the  freeholders  of  Hanover 
sent  Patrick  Henry  and  his  half-brother,  John  Syme. 
"  United  we  stand,  divided  we  fall,"  said  the  freehold 
ers  in  their  address  to  the  two  delegates.  Nor  was  the 
spirit  of  the  convention  itself  less  ardent.  All  things 
were  making  for  union.  Unlike  Samuel  Adams,  Henry 
had  no  occasion  for  further  local  manoeuvring.  With 
Peyton  Randolph,  Richard  Henry  Lee,  George  Wash 
ington,  Richard  Bland,  Benjamin  Harrison,  and  Ed 
mund  Pendleton,  he  was  chosen  to  attend  the  Conti 
nental  Congress. 

"  Unlike  Adams,"  it  is  said  ;  and  with  reason,  for 
though  Adams  had  overthrown  his  powerful  antagonist, 
Thomas  Hutchinson,  he  was  outfaced  by  General  Gage 
with  veteran  regiments  at  his  back.  In  crediting  Henry 
with  successful  leadership  in  Virginia,  the  honest  mind 
cannot  but  revert  to  the  burden  borne  by  Adams  in 
Massachusetts.  And  to  round  out  our  comparison 
between  the  two  leaders,  Adams  may  well  come  into 
our  pages  at  this  particular  juncture.  Many  able  men 
in  many  parts  of  the  land  were  at  work  in  a  common 
cause;  and  only  by  taking  their  several  efforts  into 
account  can  one  reach  a  just  conclusion  as  to  the  ser 
vices  and  merits  of  an  individual.  Some  there  were 
whose  fortunes  were  directly  jeopardized;  some  whose 
sacrifices  were  nobly  made  ;  some  whose  great  worth 
only  their  neighbors  knew.  But  in  the  matter  of  the 
committees  of  correspondence  which  led  to  the  "  Con 
gress  of  Committees  "  now  about  to  meet,  one  dare  not 
fail  to  give  Adams  his  due.  He  did  not  suggest  the 

143 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

idea  of  permanent  intercolonial  committees — that  was 
a  Virginia  suggestion ;  but  in  all  likelihood  the  plan  was 
an  outgrowth  of  his  scheme  for  interknitting  the  Massa 
chusetts  towns.  Professor  James  K.  Hosmer,  telling 
of  the  genesis  of  the  Boston  Committee,  adds : 

"  The  towns  almost  unanimously  appointed  similar  com 
mittees  ;  from  every  quarter  came  replies  in  which  the  senti 
ments  of  Samuel  Adams  were  echoed.  In  the  library  of  Ban 
croft  is  a  volume  of  manuscripts,  worn  and  stained  by  time, 
which  have  an  interest  scarcely  inferior  to  that  possessed  by  the 
Declaration  of  Independence  itself.  .  .  .  They  are  the  original 
replies  sent  by  the  Massachusetts  towns  to  Samuel  Adams' 
Committee,  sitting  in  Faneuil  Hall,  during  those  first  months 
of  1773.  One  may  well  read  them  with  bated  breath,  for  it  is 
the  touch  of  the  elbow  as  the  stout  little  democracies  dress  up 
into  line,  just  before  they  plunge  into  actual  fight  at  Concord 
and  Bunker  Hill.  There  is  sometimes  a  noble  scorn  of  the  re 
straints  of  orthography,  as  of  the  despotism  of  Great  Britain, 
in  the  work  of  the  old  town  clerks,  for  they  generally  were 
secretaries  of  the  committees ;  and  once  in  a  while  a  touch  of 
Dogberry's  quaintness,  as  the  punctilious  officials,  though  not 
always  'putting  God  first,'  yet  take  pains  that  there  shall  be 
no  mistake  as  to  their  piety  by  making  every  letter  in  the 
name  of  the  Deity  a  rounded  capital.  Yet  the  documents  ought 
to  inspire  the  deepest  reverence.  They  constitute  the  highest 
mark  the  town-meeting  has  ever  touched." 

Adams  had  set  a  great  yeomanry  astir  and  become 
their  master  spirit.  We  have  brought  Henry  to  the 
point  of  setting  out  for  Philadelphia;  let  us  see  how 
Adams  and  his  associates  turned  their  faces  towards 
the  same  city.  "Am  told,"  says  John  Andrews,  "they 
made  a  very  respectable  parade  in  sight  of  five  of  the 
regiments  encamped  on  the  Common,  being  in  a  coach 
and  four,  preceded  by  two  white  servants  well  mounted 
and  armed,  with  four  blacks  behind  in  livery,  two  on 
horseback  and  two  footmen."  It  was  a  new  experience 
for  Samuel  Adams — his  first  long  trip  from  Boston; 
it  was  a  new  experience  for  Patrick  Henry — rarely 

144 


Ix^vv 

EARLY  LEADERSHIP 

had  he  been  under  any  other  blue  roof  than  that  which 
arched  from  the  Appalachies  to  the  Chesapeake. 

With  Pitt  at  the  opening,  Pitt  also  comes  in  at  the 
close  of  this  chapter  of  contrasts  and  comparisons ;  for, 
in  his  manuscript  "  History  of  Virginia,"  Edmund 
Randolph,  who  in  Stamp  Act  times  was  a  fine  little 
Williamsburg  aristocrat  of  twelve,  drew  a  parallel 
between  the  two  orators,  and  depicted  Henry  in  the 
elaborate  manner  now  about  to  be  reproduced.  Of 
the  young  men  of  the  Revolution  few  were  so  rich  in 
promise  as  the  learned  and  brilliant  Randolph,  Wash 
ington's  aide — the  Whig  son  of  a  Tory  father  who  fled 
to  die  in  lamentation  over-sea.  Like  Judge  St.  George 
Tucker,  Randolph  was  by  no  means  a  Henry  enthusiast 
— at  least  in  his  latter  days.  Politics  bred  coldness  as 
well  as  heat.  Tucker  once  permitted  himself  to  be 
unfair  towards  Henry ;  and,  later,  Randolph  was  at 
bitter  odds  with  him.  Thus  Tucker's  pen-sketch, 
already  given,  as  well  as  Randolph's,  which  follows, 
was  made  with  the  left  hand  rather  than  with  the  right. 
No  incense  is  burned  by  either.  Having  told  of  the 
aristocracy,  this  grandson  of  Sir  John  Randolph  pro 
ceeds,  in  his  deliberate  and  exact,  if  somewhat  oracular, 
style : 

"To  Patrick  Henry  the  first  place  is  due,  as  being  the  first 
who  broke  the  influence  of  that  aristocracy.  Little  and  feeble 
as  it  was,  and  incapable  of  daring  to  assert  any  privilege  clash 
ing  with  the  right  of  the  people  at  large,  it  was  no  small  exer 
tion  in  him  to  surprise  them  with  the  fact  that  a  new  path  was 
opened  to  the  temple  of  honor,  besides  that  which  led  through 
the  favor  of  the  King. 

"  He  was  respectable  in  his  parentage ;  but  the  patrimony  of 
his  ancestors  and  himself  was  too  scanty  to  feed  ostentation  or 
luxury.  From  education  he  derived  those  manners  which  be 
long  to  the  real  Virginian  planter,  and  which  were  his  ornament, 
in  no  less  disdaining  an  abridgement  of  personal  independence, 
than  in  observing  every  decorum  interwoven  with  the  comfort 
of  society. 

10  145 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

"  With  his  years  the  unbought  means  of  popularity  increased. 
Identified  with  the  people,  they  clothed  him  with  the  confidence 
of  a  favorite  son.  Until  his  Resolutions  on  the  Stamp  Act,  he 
had  been  unknown,  except  to  those  with  whom  he  had  asso 
ciated  in  the  hardy  sports  of  the  field  and  the.  avowed  neglect 
of  literature.  Still  he  did  not  escape  notice,  as  occasionally 
retiring  within  himself  in  silent  reflection,  and  sometimes  des 
canting  with  peculiar  emphasis  on  the  martyrs  in  the  cause  of 
liberty.  This  enthusiasm  was  nourished  by  his  partiality  for 
the  dissenters  from  the  established  church.  He  often  listened 
to  them,  while  they  were  waging  their  steady  and  finally  ef 
fectual  war  against  the  burthens  of  that  church,  and  from  a 
repetition  of  his  sympathy  with  the  history  of  their  sufferings, 
he  unlocked  the  human  heart,  and  transferred  into  civil  discus 
sions  many  of  the  bold  licenses  which  prevailed  in  the  religions. 
If  he  was  not  a  constant  hearer  and  admirer  of  that  stupendous 
master  of  the  human  passions,  George  Whitefield,  he  was  a  fol 
lower,  a  devotee  of  some  of  his  most  powerful  disciples  at 
least.  All  these  advantages  he  employed  by  a  demeanor  inof 
fensive,  conciliating,  and  abounding  in  good  humor. 

"  For  a  short  time  he  practiced  the  law  in  a  humble  sphere — 
too  humble  for  the  real  height  of  his  powers.  He  then  took  a 
seat  at  the  bar  of  the  General  Court,  the  supreme  tribunal  of 
Virginia,  among  a  constellation  of  eminent  lawyers  and  schol 
ars,  and  was  in  great  request  even  on  questions  for  which  he 
had  not  been  prepared  by  much  previous  erudition. 

"  Upon  the  theatre  of  legislation,  he  entered,  regardless  of 
that  criticism  which  was  profusely  bestowed  on  his  language, 
pronunciation,  and  gesture.  Nor  was  he  absolutely  exempt 
from  an  irregularity  in  his  language,  a  certain  homespun  pro 
nunciation,  and  a  degree  of  awkwardness  in  the  cold  commence 
ment  of  his  gesture.  But  the  corresponding  looks  and  emo 
tions  of  those  whom  he  addressed  speedily  announced  that 
language  may  be  sometimes  peculiar,  and  even  quaint,  while 
it  is  at  the  same  time  expressive  and  appropriate;  that  a  pro 
nunciation  which  might  disgust  in  a  drawing-room  may  yet 
find  access  to  the  heart  of  a  popular  Assembly;  and  that  a 
gesture  at  first  too  much  the  effect  of  indolence  may  expand 
itself  in  the  progress  of  delivery  into  forms  which  would  be 
above  rule  and  compass,  but  strictly  within  the  prompting  of 
nature.  Compared  with  any  of  his  more  refined  contempo 
raries  and  rivals,  he  by  his  imagination,  which  painted  to  the 
soul,  eclipsed  the  sparklings  of  art ;  and  knowing  what  chord  of 
the  heart  would  sound  in  unison  with  his  immediate  purpose, 

146 


EARLY  LEADERSHIP 

and  with  what  strength  or  peculiarity  it  ought  to  be  touched, 
he  had  scarcely  ever  languished  in  a  minority  up  to  the  time 
to  which  his  character  is  now  brought. 

"  Contrasted  with  the  most  renowned  of  British  orators,  the 
elder  William  Pitt,  he  was  not  inferior  to  him  in  the  intrepidity 
of  metaphor.  Like  him,  he  possessed  a  vein  of  sportive  ridi 
cule,  but  without  arrogance  or  dictatorial  malignity.  In  Henry's 
exordium  there  was  a  simplicity  and  even  carelessness,  which 
to  a  stranger,  who  had  never  before  heard  him,  promised  little. 
A  formal  division  of  his  intended  discourse  he  never  made,  but 
even  the  first  distance,  which  he  took  from  his  main  ground, 
was  not  so  remote  as  to  obscure  it,  or  to  require  any  distortion 
of  his  course  to  reach  it.  With  an  eye  which  possessed  neither 
positive  beauty,  nor  acuteness,  and  which  he  fixed  upon  the 
moderator  of  the  Assembly  addressed,  without  straying  in  quest 
of  applause,  he  contrived  to  be  the  focus  to  which  every  person 
present  was  directed,  even  at  the  moment  of  the  apparent 
languor  of  his  opening.  He  transfused  into  the  breasts  of 
others  the  earnestness  depicted  in  his  own  features,  which  ever 
forbade  a  doubt  of  sincerity.  In  others  rhetorical  artifice,  and 
unmeaning  expletives,  have  been  often  employed  as  scouts  to 
seize  the  wandering  attention  of  the  audience :  in  him  the 
absence  of  trick  constituted  the  triumph  of  nature.  His  was  the 
only  monotony  which  I  ever  heard  reconcilable  with  true  elo 
quence ;  its  chief  note  was  melodious,  but  the  sameness  was 
diversified  by  a  mixture  of  sensations,  which  a  dramatic  ver 
satility  of  action  and  countenance  produced.  His  pauses,  which 
for  their  length  might  sometimes  be  feared  to  dispel  the  atten 
tion,  rivetted  it  the  more  by  raising  the  expectation  of  renewed 
brilliancy.  In  pure  reasoning  he  encountered  many  successful 
competitors ;  in  the  wisdom  of  books  many  superiors ;  but 
though  he  might  be  inconclusive,  he  was  never  frivolous;  and 
arguments  which  at  first  seemed  strange,  were  afterwards  dis 
covered  to  be  select  in  their  kind,  because  adapted  to  some 
peculiarity  in  his  audience.  His  style  of  oratory  was  vehement, 
without  transporting  him  beyond  the  power  of  self-command, 
or  wounding  his  opponents  by  deliberate  offence ;  after  a  debate 
had  ceased,  he  was  surrounded  by  them  on  the  first  occasion 
with  pleasantry  on  some  of  its  incidents.  His  figures  of  speech, 
when  borrowed,  were  often  borrowed  from  the  Scriptures.  The 
prototypes  of  others  were  the  sublime  scenes  and  objects  of 
nature ;  and  an  occurrence  of  the  instant  he  never  failed  to 
employ  with  all  the  energy  of  which  it  was  capable.  His 
lightning  consisted  in  quick  successive  flashes,  which  rested 

147 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

only  to  alarm  the  more.  His  ability  as  a  writer  cannot  be 
insisted  on :  nor  was  he  fond  of  a  length  of  details,  but  for 
grand  impressions  in  the  defence  of  liberty,  the  western  world 
has  not  yet  been  able  to  exhibit  a  rival.  His  nature  had  prob 
ably  denied  to  him,  under  any  circumstances,  the  capacity  of 
becoming  a  Pitt,  while  Pitt  himself  would  have  been  but  a 
defective  instrument  in  a  Revolution  the  essence  of  which 
was  deep  and  pervading  popular  sentiment." 


148 


VIII 

ON   A  LARGER   STAGE — THE   CONTINENTAL  CONGRESS 

WHAT  is  our  American  tendency  with  respect  to 
those  who  colonized  this  part  of  the  world,  freed  it  from 
foreign  control,  and  opened  it  to  the  use  of  man? 
Towards  hero-worship,  beyond  doubt. 

So  strong  is  this  tendency  that  it  puts  us  under  an 
illusion,  makes  poetry  sometimes  out  of  rank  prose,  and 
keeps  us  from  seeing  the. colonists,  founders  and  pion 
eers,  as  they  actually  were. 

On  the  other  hand,  those  who  attempt  to  destroy  the 
illusion  often  go  too  far  in  their  iconoclasm.  The  swing 
is  from  one  extreme  to  its  opposite.  At  times  we  suspect 
our  idol-smashers  of  seeking  to  curry  favor  with  high 
authorities  abroad — the  world-scholars,  who  themselves 
are  under  still  older  illusions.  We  see  also  that  the 
iconoclasts  omit,  or  severely  qualify,  certain  old-fash 
ioned  laudatory  passages,  however  well-based,  as  if 
determined  not  to  lay  themselves  open  to  the  charge 
of  departing  from  a  set  tone  of  restraint  and  reserve. 
Not  a  few  of  them  mistake  abuse  for  illuminating  fact ; 
accordingly,  they  seek  to  rewrite  Revolutionary  history 
from  the  standpoint  of  petty  scandal.  They  patch 
anecdotes  together,  and  give  us  a  caricature  in  silhouette 
rather  than  a  portrait  or  a  character.  Thus  they  attack 
John  Hancock — tell  how  Samuel  Adams  prepared  his 
speeches  for  him.  They  attack  Franklin — assume  that 
he  was  lukewarm  in  behalf  of  the  colonies  because  his 
son  was  a  crown  officer;  and  they  dwell  with  unction 
upon  the  day  when  "  Poor  Richard "  cowered  under 
Wedderburn's  savage  assault  in  the  presence  of  the  Privy 
Councillors.  They  attack  Washington — even  tell  of 

149 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

his  false  teeth,  made  of  hippopotamus  tusks;  his  im 
mense  nose,  often  red;  his  morning  dram;  his  propen 
sity  to  cuff  stable-boys  when  they  failed  to  rub  the  mud 
off  the  legs  of  his  coach-horses;  his  riches  got  by  mar 
riage;  his  distresses  and  fits  of  anger,  due  to  the  self 
ishness,  cunning,  and  duplicity  of  some  of  the  same 
public  men  now  beautifully  embalmed  in  our  hero- 
books.  They  dig  up  journals,  diaries,  letters,  ana,  and 
memoirs,  like  Jefferson's  and  Graydon's,  and  prove  to 
us  that  our  worshipful  great  ones  were  really  little 
mortals  made  of  clay — in  fine  and  in  fact,  that  our 
"  worthies  "  were  unworthy  of  the  admiration  and  rev 
erence  we  bestow  upon  them.  There  is  no  denying 
that  the  bit  of  gossip,  the  realistic  trifle,  often  serves 
a  good  purpose.  It  does  so  when  it  helps  to  humanize 
— when  it  brings  us  to  a  clear  view  of  some  hazy  im 
mortal  who  up  to  that  time  may  have  been  so  unreal 
to  us  as  to  be  beyond  our  sympathies. 

But  in  spite  of  defamation,  and  in  spite  of  the  method 
of  judicious  measurement  affected  by  those  who  go  to 
England  and  look  back  upon  America  to  get  its  size 
before  writing  about  it,  we  hold  fast  to  our  heroes. 
We  are  not  so  lacking  in  sense  as  to  run  to  spread- 
eagleism.  Yet  we  cannot  be  tepid.  Why  should  we  be  ? 
Who  sowed,  we  say,  where  millions  upon  millions 
reap?  Who  put  the  nation  in  a  way  to  grow  towards 
its  present  greatness  and  that  greatness  inconceivable 
promised  for  the  future?  Again  the  founders  of 
the  Republic  loom  large  and  take  on  the  hero  size. 
Think  as  we  may,  the  masses  of  us  circle  back  in  the  end 
to  the  point  whence  we  took  our  start — to  our  illusions, 
if  you  please,  to  our  deep  love  for  these  men  and  our 
joy  in  them. 

The  truth  is,  the  First  Congress  was  so  manifestly 
admirable  as  to  evoke  richer  eulogy  in  its  own  day  than 
it  does  in  ours.  The  Earl  of  Camden  said  that  he 

150 


ON  A  LARGER  STAGE 

"  would  have  given  half  his  fortune  to  have  been  a 
member  of  that  which  he  believed  to  be  the  most 
virtuous  public  body  of  men  which  ever  had  or  ever 
would  meet  together  in  this  world."  Chatham  said,  in 
the  House  of  Lords: 

"  When  your  lordships  look  at  the  papers  transmitted  us  from 
America,  when  you  consider  their  decency,  firmness,  and  wis 
dom,  you  cannot  but  respect  their  cause,  and  wish  to  make  it 
your  own.  For  myself,  I  must  declare  and  avow  that  in  all  my 
reading  of  history  and  observation — and  it  has  been  my  favor 
ite  study — I  have  read  Thucydides,  and  have  studied  and  ad 
mired  the  master-states  of  the  world — that  for  solidity  of  rea 
soning,  force  of  sagacity,  and  wisdom  of  conclusion  under 
such  a  complication  of  difficult  circumstances,  no  nation  or 
body  of  men  can  stand  in  preference  to  the  General  Congress 
at  Philadelphia.  I  trust  it  is  obvious  to  your  lordships  that  all 
attempts  to  impose  servitude  upon  such  men,  to  establish 
despotism  over  such  a  mighty  continental  nation,  must  be  vain, 
must  be  fatal." 

Let  us  look  at  close  range  upon  the  members  of  this 
Congress.  Sunburnt  from  off  the  sea,  the  South  Caro 
linians  were  first  to  reach  the  place  of  meeting.  Two 
were  brought  by  the  Charleston  packet ;  two  by  the  "  Sea 
Nymph/'  No  Georgians  appeared.  The  Northern  dele 
gates  came  down  on  horseback  or  by  coach.  For  some 
hundreds  of  miles  their  journey  was  a  patriotic  progress. 
Feasts  awaited  them;  bells  were  rung,  and  gunpowder 
salutes  were  sounded.  Anon  cavalcades  accompanied 
them,  and  for  the  Massachusetts  delegates  in  the  last 
stage  of  their  journey  there  was  an  unexpected  dip  into 
American  politics.  Not  all  things  connected  with  the 
First  Continental  Congress  were  so  "  high-erected  "  as 
Lord  Camden  and  Lord  Chatham  imagined.  Says  John 
Adams : 

"  We  were  met  at  Frankfort  [Frankford]  by  Dr.  Rush,  Mr. 
Mifflin,  Mr.  Bayard,  and  several  other  of  the  most  active  Sons 
of  Liberty  in  Philadelphia,  who  desired  a  conference  with  us. 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

We  invited  them  to  take  Tea  with  us  in  a  private  apartment. 
They  asked  leave  to  give  us  some  information  and  advice, 
which  we  thankfully  granted.  They  represented  to  us  that  the 
friends  of  Government  in  Boston  and  in  the  Eastern  States,  in 
their  correspondence  with  their  friends  in  Pennsylvania  and 
all  the  Southern  States,  had  represented  us  as  four  desperate 
adventurers.  '  Mr.  Gushing  was  a  harmless  kind  of  man,  but 
poor,  and  wholly  dependent  upon  his  popularity  for  his  sub 
sistence.  Mr.  Samuel  Adams  was  a  very  artful,  designing  man, 
but  desperately  poor  and  wholly  dependent  upon  his  popularity 
with  the  lowest  vulgar  for  his  living.  John  Adams  and  Mr. 
Paine  were  two  young  Lawyers,  of  no  great  talents,  reputation, 
or  weight,  who  had  no  other  means  of  raising  themselves  into 
consequence  but  by  courting  popularity.'  We  were  all  suspected 
of  having  Independence  in  view.  Now,  said  they,  you  must  not 
utter  the  word  Independence,  nor  give  the  least  hint  or  in 
sinuation  of  the  idea,  neither  in  Congress  or  any  private  con 
versation;  if  you  do,  you  are  undone;  for  Independence  is  as 
unpopular  in  Pennsylvania  and  in  all  the  Middle  and  Southern 
States  as  the  Stamp  Act  itself.  No  man  dares  to  speak  of  it. 
Moreover  you  are  the  Representatives  of  the  suffering  State. 
You  are  thought  to  be  too  warm,  too  zealous,  too  sanguine ;  you 
must  therefore  be  very  cautious.  You  must  not  come  forward 
with  any  bold  measures ;  you  must  not  pretend  to  take  the  lead. 
You  know  Virginia  is  the  most  populous  State  in  the  Union. 
They  are  very  proud  of  their  '  antient  Dominion/  as  they  call  it ; 
they  think  they  have  the  right  to  lead  the  Southern  States; 
and  the  Middle  States,  too,  are  too  much  disposed  to  yield  to 
them.  This  made  a  deep  impression  on  my  mind,  and  it  had  an 
equal  effect  on  my  colleagues.  This  conversation,  and  the  prin 
ciples,  facts,  and  motives  suggested  in  it,  have  given  a  color, 
complexion,  and  character  to  the  whole  policy  of  the  United 
States  from  that  day  to  this  (Aug.  6,  1822).  Without  it  ... 
Mr.  Jefferson  [would  never]  have  been  the  Author  of  the 
Declaration  of  Independence,  nor  Mr.  Richard  Henry  Lee  the 
mover  of  it.  ...  Although  this  advice  dwelt  deeply  on  my  mind, 
I  had  not  in  my  nature  prudence  and  caution  enough  always  to 
observe  it.  It  soon  became  rumored  about  the  city  that  John 
Adams  was  for  Independence;  the  Quakers  and  Proprietary 
gentlemen  took  the  alarm ;  represented  me  as  the  worst  of  men ; 
the  true-blue  Sons  of  Liberty  pitied  me;  all  put  me  under  a 
kind  of  Coventry.  I  was  avoided  like  a  man  infected  with  the 
Leprosy.  I  walked  the  streets  of  Philadelphia  in  solitude,  borne 
down  by  the  weight  of  care  and  unpopularity." 

152 


ON  A  LARGER  STAGE 

In  his  "  Diary,"  after  telling  of  the  Frankford  con 
ference,  Adams  further  says : 

"  We  then  rode  into  town,  and  dirty,  dusty,  and  fatigued  as 
we  were,  could  not  resist  the  importunity  to  go  to  the  tavern, 
the  most  genteel  one  in  America.  .  .  .  Here  we  had  a  fresh 
welcome  to  the  city  of  Philadelphia,  and,  after  some  time  spent 
in  conversation,  a  curtain  was  drawn,  and  in  the  other  half 
of  the  chamber  a  supper  appeared,  as  elegant  as  any  ever  laid 
upon  the  table." 

This  was  on  the  2Qth  of  August.  Patrick  Henry  was 
still  in  Virginia.  For  the  sake  of  the  glimpses  we  shall 
get  of  him — and  throughout  this  period  of  the  Conti 
nental  Congress  we  are  to  see  him  over  some  one  else's 
shoulder,  rather  than  full  front,  as  we  should  like — it 
behooves  us  to  follow  him  in  his  northward  journey. 
Quite  as  spirited  as  any  of  John  Adams'  sketches  of 
the  delegates  is  one  by  an  old  vestryman,  Roger  Atkin 
son,  of  Mannsfield,  near  Petersburg,  who  described  the 
Virginia  members  in  a  letter  to  his  brother-in-law, 
Samuel  Pleasants.  Henry,  he  says,  "  is  a  real  half- 
Quaker — your  brother's  man — moderate  and  mild,  and  in 
religious  matters  a  saint ;  but  the  very  d — 1  in  politics — a 
son  of  thunder.  He  will  shake  the  Senate.  Some  years 
ago  he  had  liked  to  have  talked  treason  into  the  House." 
Of  Peyton  Randolph,  he  says :  "  A  venerable  man,  whom 
I  well  know  and  love ;  an  honest  man ;  has  knowledge, 
temper,  experience,  judgment — above  all,  integrity;  a 
true  Roman  spirit."  Of  Richard  Henry  Lee,  he  says: 
"  I  think  I  know  the  man,  and  I  like  him :  need  I  say 
more  ?  "  Of  Washington,  he  says :  "  He  is  a  soldier — a 
warrior ;  he  is  a  modest  man ;  sensible ;  speaks  little ;  in 
action  cool,  like  a  Bishop  at  his  prayers."  Of  Colonel 
Bland,  he  says :  "  A  wary,  old,  experienced  veteran  at 
the  bar  and  in  the  Senate;  has  something  of  the  look 
of  old  musty  parchments,  which  he  handleth  and 

153 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

studieth  much.  He  formerly  wrote  a  treatise  against 
the  Quakers  on  water-baptism."  Of  Benjamin  Harri 
son,  he  says :  "  He  is  your  neighbour,  and  brother-in- 
law  to  the  Speaker  (Peyton  Randolph)  ;  I  need  not 
describe  him."  Of  Pendleton,  he  says :  "  The  last  and 
best,  though  all  good.  The  last  shall  be  first,  says  the 
Scripture.  He  is  an  humble  and  religious  man  and  must 
be  exalted.  He  is  a  smooth-tongued  Speaker,  and, 
though  not  so  old,  may  be  compared  to  old  Nestor, — 

' '  Experienced  Nestor,  in  persuasion  skill'd, 

Words  sweet  as  honey  from  his  lips  distill'd.'  " 

Two  of  these  worthies,  Pendleton  and  Henry,  became 
Washington's  guests  at  Mount  Vernon  on  the  3<Dth  of 
August,  and  remained  there  until  after  dinner  on  the 
3 1 st.  Lee  was  to  have  joined  them,  but  had  been  de 
tained  at  his  Chantilly  estate  in  Westmoreland.  Ran 
dolph,  Harrison,  and  Bland  had  gone  on  before.  Wash 
ington,  it  may  be  noted,  was  now  taking  an  advanced 
and  resolute  stand  on  Henry's  ground.  As  it  was  Wash 
ington  who  moved  to  associate  for  non-importation, 
there  is  reason  to  believe  that  he  had  determined  long 
before  to  do  what  he  could  to  strengthen  the  colonial 
contention;  but  in  the  summer  of  1774  there  are  un 
mistakable  signs  of  an  intensification  of  feeling  on  his 
part — of  his  settled  purpose  to  lend  the  full  weight  of 
his  shoulder  against  the  King.  His  speech  had  been 
the  most  eloquent  in  the  Convention.  He  had  said: 
"  I  will  raise  one  thousand  men,  subsist  them  at  my  own 
expense,  and  march  myself  at  their  head  for  the  relief 
of  Boston."  His  wife  was  equally  zealous.  If,  on  the 
evening  of  the  3Oth,  she  talked  with  Henry  about  his 
neighbors,  her  cousins,  in  Hanover,  she  probably  also 
took  part  in  the  political  conversation — made  all  the  more 
animated  by  the  presence  of  George  Mason,  who  had 
come  over  from  Gunston  Hall  to  bid  the  travellers  God- 

154 


ON  A  LARGER  STAGE 

speed  to  Philadelphia  and  a  happy  issue  for  the  con 
tinent.  We  can  well  imagine  this  party  on  the  Mount 
Vernon  lawn,  under  the  August  stars,  with  the  Potomac 
sweeping  by.  "  Mrs.  Washington,"  wrote  Pendleton  to 
a  friend,  "  talked  like  a  Spartan  to  her  son  on  his  going 
to  battle.  '  I  hope  you  will  all  stand  firm/  she  said.  '  I 
know  George  will.' ' 

Of  this  meeting,  and  the  Philadelphia  pilgrimage, 
Irving  says :  "  Washington  was  joined  at  Mount  Vernon 
by  Patrick  Henry  and  Edmund  Pendleton,  and  they  per 
formed  the  journey  together  on  horseback.  It  was  a 
noble  companionship.  Henry  was  then  in  the  youthful 
vigor  and  elasticity  of  his  bounding  genius,  ardent,  acute, 
fanciful,  eloquent;  Pendleton,  schooled  in  public  life, 
a  veteran  in  council,  with  native  force  of  intellect,  and 
habits  of  deep  reflection ;  Washington,  in  the  meridian 
of  his  days,  mature  in  wisdom,  comprehensive  in  mind, 
sagacious  in  foresight." 

Had  these  three  men  been  knightly  leaders  such  as 
Sir  Walter  Scott  drew  with  blithesome  pen,  they  would 
have  spurred  their  horses  into  the  Potomac,  swum  them 
across  that  broad  and  dangerous  tide,  and,  waving  fare 
well  to  Mrs.  Washington  from  the  Maryland  shore, 
dashed  away  towards  the  North.  But  the  matter-of-fact 
Washington  writes : 

"Aug.  31.  All  the  above  gentlemen  dined  here;  after  which, 
with  Colo.  Pendleton  and  Mr.  Henry,  I  set  out  on  my  journey 
to  Philadelphia,  and  reached  Upper  Marlboro. 

"  Sept.  i.  Breakfasted  at  Queen  Anne.  Dined  at  Annapolis 
and  lodged  at  Rock  Hall." 

And  so  on,  throughout  the  itinerary.  There  is  no  Sir 
Walter  Scott  here — not  even  a  John  Adams.  How 
appreciative  we  ought  to  be  of  Adams  as  a  gossip  of  the 
Revolution,  as  well  as  one  of  its  chief  promoters,  drivers, 
and  managers!  His  very  vanity  serves  us;  just  as, 

155 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

conversely,  the  lack  of  it  in  others  operates  to  deprive 
us  of  little  links  in  the  chain  of  fact.  He  was  a  force 
ful  man,  but  often  begrudged  the  glory  bestowed  else 
where.  Underestimating  the  abilities  of  others,  he 
naively  gave  himself  good  measure.  Censorious  he  was, 
but  illuminating — the  father  of  a  fearless  and  still  more 
censorious  son.  Had  John  Adams  been  with  the  Vir 
ginia  travellers,  he  probably  would  have  told  us  that 
in  passing  from  Annapolis  to  Rock  Hall,  which  is  on 
the  Eastern  Shore  of  Maryland,  they  sailed  across  the 
broad  and  beautiful  Chesapeake  Bay.  He  would  have 
told  us  how  cool  and  green  the  water  looked,  and  how 
beautifully  it  broke  into  spray;  and  how  many  sails  he 
counted  far  and  near;  and  what  Patrick  Henry  said  to 
him  about  that  "  Csesar  "  speech  which  made  the  Bur 
gesses  grow  red  in  the  face,  crying,  "  Treason ! 
Treason !  "  But  it  is  only  the  unimaginative  Washing 
ton  who  reports  for  us: 

"  Sept  2.  Dined  at  Rock  Hall  (waiting  for  my  horses), 
and  lodged  at  New  Town  on  Chester. 

"  Sept.  3.  Breakfasted  at  Down's.  Dined  at  the  Brick  Tavern 
(Carson's)  and  lodged  at  New  Castle. 

"  Sept.  4.  Breakfasted  at  Christeen  Ferry.  Dined  at  Chester 
and  lodged  at  Doctor  Shippen's  in  Philadelphia,  after  supping 
at  ye  New  Tavern." 

No  doubt  a  welcoming  escort  would  have  shown  the 
three  Virginians  into  the  city  had  they  not  come  on  a 
Sunday.  As  it  was,  their  arrival  was  soon  known. 
Writing  to  his  wife,  Silas  Deane  said: 

"  In  the  afternoon  came  in  the  Virginia  and  Maryland 
delegates.  The  Virginia,  and  indeed  all  the  Southern  delegates, 
appear  like  men  of  importance.  We  waited  on  and  were 
introduced  to  them  in  the  evening.  They  are  sociable,  sensible, 
and  spirited  men,  and  the  short  opportunity  I  had  of  attend 
ing  to  their  conversation  gives  me  the  highest  ideas  of  their 
principles  and  character."  Again  he  wrote :  "  You  may  tell 

156 


ON  A  LARGER  STAGE 

your  friends  that  I  never  met,  nor  scarcely  had  an  idea  of 
meeting,  with  men  of  such  firmness,  sensibility,  spirit,  and 
thorough  knowledge  of  the  interests  of  America  as  the  gentle 
men  from  the  Southern  Provinces  appear  to  be." 

"  They  are  fine  fellows  from  Virginia,"  wrote  Joseph 
Reed,  "  but  they  are  very  high.  The  Bostonians  are 
mere  milksops  to  them.  We  understand  they  are  the 
capital  men  of  the  colony,  both  in  fortune  and  under 
standing." 

In  these  little  group-sketches  there  is  no  singling  out 
of  any  one,  so  we  are  seeing  Henry  only  by  indirection. 
He  blends  with  the  others.  Soon  the  various  delegations 
pass  into  one  great  picture,  and  it  becomes  difficult  to 
dissociate  and  individualize.  Thanks  to  John  Adams, 
we  are  enabled  to  fix  our  attention  for  a  moment  upon 
Thomas  Lynch,  of  South  Carolina,  who  had  much  to 
do  with  the  preliminary  arrangements  of  the  Congress, 
"  a  solid,  firm,  judicious  man  "  ;  upon  Philip  Livingston, 
of  New  York,  "  a  great,  rough,  rapid  mortal  " ;  upon 
William  Livingston,  of  New  Jersey,  "  a  plain  man,  tall, 
black  .  .  .  nothing  elegant  or  genteel  about  him  " ;  upon 
James  Duane,  of  New  York,  "  who  has  a  sly,  surveying 
eye,  a  little  squint-eyed  .  .  .  very  sensible,  I  think,  and 
very  artful  "  ;  and  upon  Caesar  Rodney,  of  Delaware, 
"  the  oddest  looking  man  in  the  world ;  he  is  tall,  thin 
and  slender  as  a  reed,  pale ;  his  face  is  not  bigger  than 
a  large  apple,  yet  there  is  sense  and  fire,  spirit,  wit,  and 
humor  in  his  countenance." 

"  At  ten,"  continues  Adams,  in  his  memorandum  for 
Monday,  September  5,  "  the  delegates  all  met  at  the 
City  Tavern,  and  walked  to  the  Carpenters'  Hall,  where 
they  took  a  view  of  the  room,  and  of  the  chamber 
where  is  an  excellent  library.  There  is  also  a  long 
entry  where  gentlemen  may  walk,  and  a  convenient 
chamber  opposite  to  the  library.  The  general  cry  was 
that  this  was  a  good  room." 

157 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

From  the  east  window  of  this  room  sloops  and  schoon 
ers  could  then  be  seen  in  Dock  Creek,  long  since  van 
ished.  The  Hall  stood  in  an  open  lot.  Delegates  had 
to  go  but  a  few  steps  from  the  New  Tavern  in  Second 
Street,  at  the  corner  of  Gold,  to  be  at  the  place  of  meet 
ing.  By  the  side  of  high  buildings  which  now  encompass 
it,  the  Hall  looks  like  a  toy  house;  yet  the  British 
soldiers  who  shot  holes  into  the  copper  ball  on  the  vane 
above  the  cupola  no  doubt  felt  that  their  target  was  high 
enough. 

To  tell  the  story  of  the  Hall  is  almost  to  tell  in 
brief  the  story  of  the  province.  The  bricks  were  from 
England,  whence  the  bulk  of  the  Quakers  came.  The 
roofing  slate  was  from  Wales,  whence  more  Quakers 
came.  Let  us  now  liken  the  mortar  to  the  Scotch-Irish 
and  the  sturdy  Germans  who  cemented  the  keystone  of 
the  Commonwealth,  and  we  round  out  our  comparison. 
To  this  day  no  bricklayer,  but  only  a  granite-cutter,  can 
break  the  mortar  used  by  the  master-carpenters  of  Phila 
delphia,  whose  trade  lineage  and  traditions  were  those 
of  the  Worshipful  Company  of  Carpenters  founded  in 
London  in  1477.  The  colonial  mechanics  built  well. 
Already  their  city  of  five  thousand  houses  was  the  model 
for  many  towns  in  the  Middle  Colonies,  and  it  was  the 
metropolis  of  the  continent.  There  were  no  Sir  Christo 
pher  Wrens  among  them,  but  they  had  learned  something 
of  Sir  Christopher's  art.  Numerous  "  elegant  seats  "  on 
the  suburban  hills  supplied  evidence  of  their  skill.  They 
were  substantial  men,  given  to  holding  fast  like  their 
hand-wrought  nails;  and,  since  the  Assembly  of  the 
province  was  about  to  occupy  the  State  House,  it  was 
doubtless  a  pleasure  to  these  builders  to  be  able  to  extend 
the  courtesy  of  their  hall  to  the  builders  of  a  nation.  At 
any  rate,  undeterred  by  such  warning  as  that  in  the 
Royalist,  which  said  to  them,  "  Your  necks  may  be  in 
conveniently  lengthened,  if  you  don't  look  out,"  they 

158 


ON  A  LARGER  STAGE 

gave  over  the  main  chamber  of  their  hall,  with  its  twelve 
twelve-paned  windows  and  its  thirteenth  fan-window, 
to  the  representatives  of  the  thirteen  colonies.  But  those 
who  in  these  days  visit  Carpenters'  Hall  to  view  the 
stage  of  action,  and  thereby  assist,  themselves,  in  re- 
peopling  it  with  the  actors,  should  be  reminded  that  only 
half  of  the  present  chamber  was  in  use  by  the  Congress. 
There  was  a  partition  then,  extending  on  the  north  and 
south  line  from  doorway  to  doorway ;  and  there  were 
two  chambers  instead  of  one. 

To  Patrick  Henry,  with  his  quick,  sharp  way  of  look 
ing  at  things,  there  must  have  been  much  of  interest  in 
the  men  he  met  and  the  sights  he  saw — the  crowds,  the 
markets,  the  paved  and  lamp-lit  streets,  the  Quaker  life 
of  the  town;  the  women,  in  drab,  no  less  fine  for  lack 
of  color  in  their  garb ;  the  red-coated  soldiers ;  sailors 
from  afar;  the  watchmen  who  called  out  the  hours 
when  all  was  still.  Untravelled  as  Henry  was,  this  must 
have  seemed  to  him  a  new  world. 

But  especially  was  he  interested  in  the  state  of  opinion 
in  this  great  colony,  and  the  prospect  of  cooperative 
effort  on  the  part  of  such  leaders  as  Galloway  and 
Dickinson.  In  Galloway  he  was  quick  to  recognize  a 
polished  man,  with  masterful  qualities,  but  no  friend, 
certainly.  With  "  Farmer  "  Dickinson,  "  tall,  slender  as 
a  reed,  pale  as  ashes,"  it  was  different.  He  was  refined, 
rich,  literary.  At  home  he  heard  from  his  own  mother 
such  Tory  foreboding  as  this :  "  Johnny,  you  will  be 
hanged ;  your  estate  will  be  forfeited  and  confiscated ; 
you  will  leave  your  excellent  wife  a  widow,  and  your 
charming  children  orphans,  beggars  and  infamous." 

Henry  could  readily  understand  the  difference  between 
Dickinson's  political  position  and  his  own.  Dickinson's 
mind  was  logical,  loyal,  unimaginative,  unrebellious.  He 
was  too  intellectual  to  blow  up  his  own  dormant  fires 
with  good  Whig  bluster.  What  did  he  care  for  the 

159 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

unborn  Republic  which  others  had  begun  to  adumbrate 
in  their  dreams?  Justice  he  wanted,  but  justice  with 
peace.  In  spite  of  royal  and  ministerial  harshness 
amounting  to  unnatural  tyranny,  he  could  not  but  love 
that  mother  country  over-sea.  He  was  a  power  among 
the  Quakers,  and  they  likewise  were  irresolute.  They 
thought  ill  of  the  politics  of  King  George,  but  well  of 
the  dear  land  whence  they  had  wandered. 

Charles  Thomson,  also,  interested  Henry.  Thomson's 
life  was  a  romance.  As  an  eleven-year-old  boy,  he  was 
one  of  the  twenty  thousand  exiles  from  Ulster.  His 
father  and  mother  were  buried  at  sea,  and  he  and  his 
little  brothers  and  sisters  were  as  waifs  on  the  shore — 
destitute,  forlorn.  At  New  Castle,  the  night  he  was  put 
off  the  ship,  he  slept  at  a  blacksmith's,  and,  hearing  the 
blacksmith  lay  plans  to  make  an  apprentice  of  him,  he 
slipped  away  in  the  darkness.  Next  morning,  on  the 
road,  a  gentlewoman  stopped  her  carriage  to  question 
him ;  made  much  of  him ;  sent  him  to  a  classical  school. 
Hearing  an  auctioneer  cry,  "An  unknown  outlandish 
book ;  who  bids  ?  "  the  boy  bought  it.  It  was  a  part 
of  the  Greek  Septuagint,  and  he  became  enamored  of 
Greek.  Once  he  walked  all  night  from  Thunder  Hill 
twenty  miles  to  town,  to  buy  a  copy  of  the  Spectator; 
and  again  he  walked  a  hundred  miles  to  construe  Greek 
with  an  expert.  His  heart  warmed  towards  the  Indians. 
When  he  was  grown,  the  Lenni  Lenape  named  him 
"  Wegh-wu-law-mo-end,"  "  the  man  who  tells  the  truth," 
because  he  reported  them  correctly.  "  Here  comes 
Charles  Thomson,  the  man  who  tells  the  truth,"  was  long 
a  phrase  of  the  town.  Just  now  he  was  known  as 
"the  Sam  Adams  of  Philadelphia  "—"  the  life  of  the 
cause  of  liberty,  they  say."  Just  now,  also,  he  was  a 
happy  man ;  for,  on  the  day  Washington's  party  crossed 
the  Chesapeake,  he  was  married  to  the  heiress  of  Har- 
riton.  He  says : 

160 


ON  A  LARGER  STAGE 

"  I  was  married  to  my  second  wife  on  a  Thursday ;  on  the 
next  Monday  I  came  to  town  to  pay  my  respects  to  my  wife's 
aunt  and  the  family.  Just  as  I  alighted  in  Chestnut  Street, 
the  doorkeeper  of  Congress  (then  first  met)  accosted  me  with 
a  message  from  them  requesting  my  presence.  Surprised  at 
this  and  not  able  to  divine  why  I  was  wanted,  I  however 
bade  my  servant  put  up  the  horses,  and  followed  the  messenger 
myself  to  the  Carpenters'  Hall  and  entered  Congress.  Here 
was  indeed  an  august  assembly,  and  deep  thought  and  solemn 
anxiety  were  observable  on  their  countenances.  I  walked  up 
the  aisle,  and  standing  opposite  to  the  President,  I  bowed 
and  told  him  I  waited  his  pleasure.  He  replied :  '  Congress 
desire  the  favor  of  you,  sir,  to  take  their  minutes.'  I  bowed 
in  acquiescence  and  took  my  seat  at  the  desk." 

That  desk  was  his  for  fifteen  years.  He  would  take 
no  pay.  "  Reticent  as  a  sphinx,"  he  was  always  punctual 
at  his  post  of  duty;  always  faithful  in  making  his 
records ;  always  courteous,  kind,  and  obliging ;  and  often 
acted  as  "  a  peacemaker  between  the  hotspurs  "  who 
from  time  to  time  appeared  in  that  body.  He  could 
have  written  the  history  of  the  Continental  Congress 
in  Homeric  Greek,  or  any  other  sort  of  Greek,  but  he 
wrote  it  not  at  all.  On  the  contrary,  this  admirable 
man — tall,  thin,  erect,  and  in  old  age  notably  snowy, 
with  locks  to  his  shoulders — who  spent  twenty-five  years 
translating  the  Scriptures,  deliberately  destroyed  his 
notes  of  the  historic  drama  enacted  under  his  eye.  Per 
haps  the  tone  of  his  mind  was  such  as  to  set  him  in 
tuitively  against  that  species  of  historical  small  talk 
now  so  greatly  esteemed.  He  was  discreet ;  he  was  con 
scientious,  and  would  not  reveal  the  secrets  of  a  Con 
gress  sitting  with  its  head  in  the  lion's  mouth.  An 
other  man's  reputation  was  as  precious  to  him  as  his 
own.  "  The  Confidential  Secretary  of  the  Continental 
Congress  " — his  epitaph — is  no  idle  alliteration ;  it  is  a 
truth  with  a  deep  meaning. 

At  the  moment  Thomson  "  bowed  and  took  his  seat," 
there  were  in  the  chamber  forty-four  members,  from 
ii  161 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

eleven  colonies.  Two  more  delegates  came  in  the  next 
day,  and  finally  the  number  was  fifty-five.  Peyton 
Randolph  had  been  chosen  to  preside,  and  the  commis 
sions  of  the  members  had  just  been  read.  "  As  the  Pres 
idency  of  Congress  was  given  to  Virginia,  so  the  first 
memorable  event  of  the  session  was  the  impassioned 
speech  by  Patrick  Henry,  reciting  the  colonial  wrongs, 
the  necessity  of  union  and  the  preservation  of  the  dem 
ocratic  part  of  the  constitution.  Applause  was  general, 
and  a  debate  followed."  Thus  summarizes  Hosmer,  in 
his  "  Samuel  Adams  " ;  but  there  are  contemporary  ref 
erences  to  Henry's  oratory  at  the  opening  of  the  session. 
Jefferson  says :  "  Mr.  Henry  and  Richard  Henry  Lee 
took  at  once  the  lead  in  that  assembly,  and  by  the 
high  style  of  their  eloquence  were  in  the  first  days  of  the 
session  looked  up  to  as  primi  inter  pares/'  The  debate 
followed  upon  a  motion  for  a  committee  to  prepare  reg 
ulations.  Whether  Congress  should  vote  "  by  colonies, 
by  poll,  or  by  interests  "  was  the  chief  question.  John 
Adams  it  is  who  reports: 

"  Mr.  Henry  then  arose,  and  said  this  was  the  first  General 
Congress  which  had  ever  happened;  that  no  former  congress 
could  be  a  precedent ;  that  we  should  have  occasion  for  more 
General  Congresses,  and  therefore  that  a  precedent  ought  to  be 
established  now;  that  it  would  be  great  injustice  if  a  little  col 
ony  should  have  the  same  weight  in  the  councils  of  America 
as  a  great  one,  and  that  therefore  he  was  for  a  committee." 

"  The  above  very  simple  narrative  of  the  action  of 
Mr.  Henry  upon  this  occasion,"  comments  Charles 
Francis  Adams,  "  strangely  contrasts  with  the  picture 
painted  by  the  florid  imagination  of  Mr.  Wirt,  as  also 
does  the  abstract  of  the  speech  with  his  idea  of  it." 
This  critic  (who  a  little  later  confuses  a  second-day 
speech  with  that  of  the  first)  assumes  the  finality  of 
his  grandfather's  dry  abstract,  which  is  a  mere  refer- 

162 


ON  A  LARGER  STAGE 

ence  in  a  running  summary.  Charles  Francis  Adams  is 
also  manifestly  unjust  when  in  another  note  he  says: 
"  This  is  probably  all  that  has  been  saved  of  the  cele 
brated  speech  of  Patrick  Henry  at  the  opening  of  the 
Congress,  which  earned  for  him  the  national  reputation 
he  has  ever  since  enjoyed."  It  is  true  that  Henry's 
first  speech  in  Congress  was  not  reported;  but  it  is  not 
true  that  the  speech  was  the  one  whereby  he  gained 
celebrity.  For  had  not  the  man's  fame  been  abroad 
nine  years  or  more  ?  But  for  Henry,  indeed,  there  might 
have  been  no  Continental  Congress.  Now,  Thomson 
lived  to  be  ninety-four.  Though  he  wrote  and  spoke 
guardedly,  he  nevertheless  added  enough  to  the  Phila 
delphia  annals  to  confirm  the  Virginia  traditions  con 
cerning  Henry's  eloquence.*  He  left  two  descriptions 
of  the  scene.  Having  described  his  own  installation  as 
Secretary,  he  adds: 

"  After  a  short  silence,  Patrick  Henry  arose  to  speak.  I 
did  not  then  know  him ;  he  was  dressed  in  a  suit  of  parson's 
gray,  and  from  his  appearance,  I  took  him  for  a  Presbyterian 
clergyman,  used  to  haranguing  the  people.  He  observed  that 
we  were  here  met  in  a  time  and  on  an  occasion  of  great 
difficulty  and  distress;  that  our  public  circumstances  were  like 
those  of  a  man  in  deep  embarrassment  and  trouble,  who  had 

*  Henry  Armitt  Brown  made  a  particular  study  of  the  Con 
tinental  Congress,  examining  the  Philadelphia  traditions  con 
cerning  it.  In  his  "  Oration  on  the  Hundredth  Anniversary  of 
Congress,"  he  said  of  Patrick  Henry :  "  A  step  in  advance  of 
his  time,  as  he  had  ever  been,  he  went  far  beyond  the  spirit 
of  the  other  delegates,  who,  with  the  exception  of  the  Adamses 
and  Gadsden,  did  not  counsel  or  desire  independence.  .  .  . 
His  eloquence  was  one  of  the  chief  forces  of  the  American 
Revolution — as  necessary  to  that  great  cause  as  the  intelligence 
of  Franklin,  the  will  of  Samuel  Adams,  the  pen  of  Thomas 
Jefferson,  or  the  sword  of  Washington.  In  such  times  of  a 
nation's  trial  there  is  always  one  voice  that  speaks  for  all. 
It  echoes  the  spirit  of  the  age.  .  .  .  The  voice  of  Patrick 
Henry  was  the  voice  of  America  struggling  for  freedom." 

163 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

called  his  friends  together  to  devise  what  was  best  to  be 
done  for  his  relief ; — one  would  propose  one  thing,  and  another 
a  different  one,  whilst  perhaps  a  third  would  think  of  some 
thing  better  suited  to  his  unhappy  circumstances,  which  he 
would  embrace,  and  think  no  more  of  the  rejected  schemes, 
with  which  he  would  have  nothing  to  do.  I  thought  that  this 
was  very  good  instruction  to  me,  with  respect  to  the  taking 
of  the  minutes.  What  Congress  adopted,  I  committed  to 
•writing;  with  what  they  rejected  I  had  nothing  further  to  do; 
and  even  this  method  led  to  some  squabbles  with  the  members 
who  were  desirous  of  having  their  speeches  and  resolutions, 
however  put  to  rest  by  the  majority,  still  preserved  upon  the 
minutes." 

We  see  why  Thomson  especially  remembered  one  of 
the  points  in  Henry's  speech ;  and  elsewhere  we  receive 
through  him  another  impression  concerning  it : 

"  None  seemed  willing  to  break  the  eventful  silence,  until  a 
grave  looking  member  in  a  plain  dark  suit  of  minister's  gray, 
and  unpowdered  wig,  arose.  All  became  fixed  in  attention  on 
him. 

" '  Conticuere  omnes,  intentique  ora  tentbant.' 

"  Then  he  (Thomson)  felt  a  sense  of  regret  that  the  seeming 
country  parson  should  so  far  have  mistaken  his  talents,  and 
the  theatre  for  their  display.  But  as  he  proceeded,  he  evinced 
such  unusual  force  of  argument,  and  such  novel  and  im 
passioned  eloquence,  as  soon  electrified  the  house.  Then  the 
excited  inquiry  passed  from  man  to  man,  Who  is  it?  Who 
is  it?  The  answer  from  the  few  who  knew  him  was,  It  is 
Patrick  Henry! 

"  '  I  lie  regit  dictis  animos  et  pectora  mulcet' " 

In  spite  of  the  intrusive  Latin,  how  like  our  Patrick 
of  the  Virginia  forum — this  grave  orator  who  made 
strangers  ashamed  of  him  in  his  halting  approach  to 
his  subject,  and  by  and  by  caused  them  to  look  at  each 
other  and  whisper,  "  Who  is  it  ?  "  Such  was  his  way. 

164 


ON  A  LARGER  STAGE 

He  never  sought  to  storm  his  auditory,  but  on  great 
occasions  his  effects  were  cumulative — he  could  elec 
trify  and  overpower.  Richard  K.  Betts,  venerable  cus 
todian  of  the  traditions  of  the  Carpenters'  Company, 
says  of  this  speech: 

"  Patrick  Henry  slowly  rose  in  a  far  off  part  of  the  hall 
and  hesitatingly  broke  the  silence.  He  calmly  reviewed  the 
wrongs  of  his  country,  until  warming  with  his  subject,  his 
cheeks  glowed,  his  eye  flashed,  and  his  voice,  rich  and  strong, 
rang  through  and  filled  the  hall." 

There  is  warrant  for  assuming  that  Henry  was  equally 
eloquent  in  his  speech  of  the  succeeding  day.  It  was 
a  day  of  excitement  and  solemnity.  On  the  strength 
of  a  rumor  that  Boston  had  been  bombarded,  muffled 
bells  sounded,  and  in  the  streets,  as  Congress  met,  the 
cry  "  War !  war !  "  was  heard.  What  this  meant  to  the 
men  who  knew  themselves  to  be  the  custodians  of  the 
liberties  of  the  people  along  the  whole  continental  shore, 
from  Nova  Scotia  to  Florida,  we  can  understand  even 
now;  for  though  we  are  far  away  from  them  in  point 
of  time,  we  are  near  to  them  in  sympathy.  They  were 
still  considering  how  the  colonies  should  vote.  In  the 
debate,  Henry  said: 

"  Government  is  dissolved.  Fleets  and  armies  and  the 
present  state  of  things  show  that  government  is  dissolved. 
Where  are  your  landmarks,  your  boundaries  of  colonies?  We 
are  in  a  state  of  nature,  sir.  I  did  propose  that  a  scale  should 
be  laid  down :  that  part  of  North  America  which  was  once 
Massachusetts  Bay,  and  that  part  which  was  once  Virginia, 
ought  to  be  considered  as  having  a  weight.  Will  not  people 
complain  [that]  ten  thousand  Virginians  have  not  outweighed 
one  thousand  others  ?  I  will  submit,  however ;  I  am  deter 
mined  to  submit,  if  I  am  overruled.  ...  I  hope  future 
ages  will  quote  our  proceedings  with  applause.  ...  It  is 
one  of  the  great  duties  of  the  democratical  part  of  the  con 
stitution  to  keep  itself  pure.  .  .  .  It  is  known  in  my  prov- 

165 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

ince  that  some  other  colonies  are  not  so  numerous  or  rich 
as  they  are.  [But]  I  am  for  giving  all  the  satisfaction  in  my 
power.  The  distinctions  between  Virginians,  Pennsylvanians, 
New  Yorkers,  and  New  Englanders  are  no  more.  I  am  not  a 
Virginian,  but  an  American." 

Coming  to  us  in  such  fragmentary  and  disjointed 
shape,  these  jerky  passages  give  only  an  echo  of  Henry's 
speeches.  The  parts  do  not  dovetail  well.  All  but  a  few 
of  the  words  are  lost — all  save  a  few  of  the  ideas, 
yet  the  results  are  evident.  And,  knowing  what  we  do 
of  Henry's  character,  we  may  conclude  that  he  was 
chiefly  concerned  about  results.  He  would  not  have 
been  human  if  he  had  not  sought  to  sustain  his  repu 
tation  as  a  good  speaker;  and  he  would  not  have  been 
Henry  if  he  had  not  endeavored  much  more  earnestly 
to  sustain  his  reputation  as  a  man  of  sense.  Being 
a  man  of  sense,  he  probably  saw  that  it  was  no  time  for 
flaming  oratory;  that  Congress  had  met  to  deliberate, 
to  knit  together  diverse  interests,  to  deal  delicately  with 
a  complex  and  most  difficult  situation,  and  finally  to 
carry  forward  a  general  Revolution  affecting  the  wel 
fare  of  three  millions  of  people.  This  "  very  d — 1  in 
politics,"  this  "  son  of  thunder,"  had  no  wish  to  "  shake 
the  Senate  "  simply  for  the  purpose  of  exhibiting  his  own 
oratorical  excellence.  His  wish  was  that  Congress 
should  act  so  justly  and  sagaciously  as  to  win  the  ap 
proval  of  patriots  everywhere.  "  I  go  upon  the  sup 
position  that  government  is  at  an  end,"  said  he.  "  All 
distinctions  are  thrown  down.  All  America  is  thrown 
into  one  mass.  We  must  aim  at  the  minutiae  of  recti 
tude." 

By  a  politic  stroke  on  this  same  exciting  second  day, 
Samuel  Adams  contrived  that  religious  differences 
should  be  sunk ;  and  next  morning  "  Parson  "  Duche, 
who  turned  Tory  in  the  end,  appeared  in  his  clerical 
robes  and  solemnized  the  proceedings.  "  A  prayer  which 

166 


ON  A  LARGER  STAGE 

he  gave  as  his  own  composition,"  says  Adams,  "  was 
as  pertinent,  as  affectionate,  as  sublime,  as  devout,  as  I 
ever  heard  offered  up  to  Heaven." 

Tory  marplots,  hoping  for  discord,  could  not  have 
chosen  a  surer  way  of  provoking  it  than  by  exciting  the 
provincial  spirit  of  the  members.  Hence  the  mischief  of 
the  question:  Should  a  major  colony  and  a  minor 
colony  have  an  equal  voice  in  the  Congress?  Henry 
must  have  known  that  he  risked  much  when  he  cried: 
"  I  am  not  a  Virginian,  but  an  American."  He  knew 
how  that  would  sound  in  certain  ears  at  home.  He  knew 
that  what  was  being  said  and  done  in  Philadelphia 
would  be  talked  over  down  country,  and  he  knew  that 
the  people  were  slow  to  ratify  dubious  proceedings. 
By  the  bent  of  his  mind  he  glanced  ahead.  He  doubt 
less  flashed  a  look  into  the  future  and  foresaw  other 
Congresses,  other  occasions  when  members  would  say: 
"  Well,  did  we  not  do  so  and  so  at  our  first  meeting?  " 
Besides,  he  disliked  to  go  against  his  own  strong  sense 
of  fair  play;  and  there  is  no  question  that  his  mind 
would  have  been  eased  if  some  more  equitable  method 
of  voting  had  been  agreed  upon.  However,  he  was  ready 
to  submit  when  Congress  decided  that,  for  the  time 
being,  the  vote  of  each  colony  should  count  as  "  one 
voice." 

The  initial  difficulty  over,  Congress  set  to  work  me 
thodically,  and  kept  at  it  for  sev.en  weeks.  One  of  the 
most  stirring  debates  was  over  the  inflammatory  re 
solves  adopted  by  towns  in  the  Massachusetts  county  of 
Suffolk  and  sent  South  by  Paul  Revere,  riding  express. 
It  was  practically  a  war  test.  No  record  exists  of 
Henry's  part  in  the  debate,  but  about  this  time  Silas 
Deane  wrote  to  his  wife : 

"  Mr.  Henry  ...  is  the  compleatest  speaker  I  ever  heard. 
If  his  future  speeches  are  equal  to  the  small  samples  he  has 
hitherto  given  us,  they  will  be  worth  preserving;  but  in  a 

167 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

letter  I  can  give  you  no  idea  of  the  music  of  his  voice,  or  the 
high  wrought  yet  natural  elegance  of  his  style  and  manner. 
Col.  Lee  is  said  to  be  his  rival  in  eloquence,  and  in  Virginia 
and  to  the  Southward  they  are  styled  the  Demosthenes  and 
Cicero  of  America.  God  grant  they  may  not,  like  them,  plead 
in  vain  for  the  liberties  of  their  country !  These  last  gentlemen 
are  now  in  full  life,  perhaps  near  fifty,  and  have  made  the 
constitution  of  Great  Britain  and  America  their  capital  study 
ever  since  the  late  troubles  between  them  have  arisen." 

Congress  voted  to  stand  by  Massachusetts,  thus  taking 
upon  the  whole  continent  the  warlike  quarrel  of  a  part. 
"  The  esteem,  the  affection,  the  admiration  for  the 
people  of  Boston  and  Massachusetts,"  wrote  John 
Adams  to  his  wife,  "  and  the  fixed  determination  that 
they  should  be  supported,  were  enough  to  melt  a  heart 
of  stone.  I  saw  the  tears  gush  into  the  eyes  of  the  old, 
grave,  pacific  Quakers  of  Pennsylvania." 

Yet  some  of  the  Quakers  were  exerting  themselves 
to  win  Congress  away  from  the  course  it  was  taking. 
Stratagems  social  and  stratagems  political  were  prac 
tised.  "  I  shall  be  killed  with  kindness  in  this  place," 
wrote  Adams.  "  We  go  to  Congress  at  nine,  and 
there  we  stay,  most  earnestly  engaged  in  debates  upon 
the  most  abstruse  mysteries  of  state,  until  three  in  the 
afternoon ;  then  we  adjourn,  and  go  to  dine  with  some  of 
the  nobles  of  Pennsylvania  at  four  o'clock,  and  feast 
upon  ten  thousand  delicacies,  and  sit  drinking  Madeira, 
Claret,  and  Burgundy  till  six  or  seven,  and  then  go  home, 
fatigued  to  death  with  business,  company,  and  care." 
Again  he  says :  "  I  am  wearied  to  death  with  the  life 
I  lead.  The  business  of  the  Congress  is  tedious  beyond 
expression.  This  assembly  is  like  no  other  that  ever 
existed.  Every  man  in  it  is  a  great  man,  an  orator,  a 
critic,  a  statesman ;  and,  therefore,  every  man  upon  every 
question  must  show  his  oratory,  his  criticism,  and  his 
political  abilities." 

Nevertheless,  Congress  got  along  with  a  sureness  and 
168 


ON  A  LARGER  STAGE 

rapidity  little  short  of  phenomenal.  It  adopted  a  Declar 
ation  of  Rights — the  forerunner  of  the  Declaration  of 
Independence ;  a  petition  to  the  King ;  an  address  to  the 
people  of  Canada;  and  a  memorial  to  the  people  of 
British  North  America.  It  debated  and  rejected  Gal 
loway's  Tory  plan  for  a  Colonial  Union,  with  a  Pres 
ident-General  to  be  appointed  by  the  King  and  a 
Grand  Council  to  be  chosen  by  the  thirteen  assemblies. 
But  its  most  important  work  was  to  devise  and 
adopt  a  non-importation,  non-consumption,  and  non- 
exportation  agreement.  Henry  opposed  the  setting  of 
too  early  a  date  with  respect  to  the  latter.  "  We 
don't  mean  to  hurt  even  our  rascals,  if  we  have 
any,"  said  he.  "  I  move  that  December  be  inserted 
instead  of  November."  His  opposition  to  the  Galloway 
scheme  brought  him  into  conflict  with  the  notable  John 
Jay,  then  under  thirty — tall,  thin,  dark-eyed,  with  aqui 
line  nose  and  a  colorless  face  lighted  up  with  amiability. 
Jay  wrote  the  address  to  the  people  of  Great  Britain, 
and  therein  attested  his  skill  in  statecraft,  law,  and  virile 
composition;  but  he  took  sides  against  Henry  in  con 
sidering  the  Galloway  plan.  Under  it,  said  Henry,  "  we 
shall  liberate  our  constituents  from  a  corrupt  House  of 
Commons,  but  throw  them  into  the  arms  of  an  American 
Legislature  that  may  be  bribed  by  that  nation  which 
avows,  in  the  face  of  the  world,  that  bribery  is  a  part 
of  her  system  of  government.  Before  we  are  obliged 
to  pay  taxes  as  they  do,  let  us  be  as  free  as  they  are; 
let  us  have  our  trade  open  with  all  the  world.  We  are 
not  to  consent  to  be  governed  by  the  representatives  of 
representatives." 

This  Galloway  measure  was  defeated  by  but  one 
vote.  "  The  action  of  Congress  on  it,"  thinks  William 
Wirt  Henry,  "  constitutes  a  crisis  in  the  history  of 
America."  Had  it  passed,  Galloway,  who  subsequently — 
upon  receipt  of  a  halter  coiled  in  a  box — fled  the  prov- 

169 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

ince,  would  not  have  returned  to  Philadelphia,  under 
cover  of  Sir  William  Howe's  army,  and  played  the  rene 
gade  among  his  former  neighbors.  But  at  this  time, 
let  us  remember,  only  a  few  men,  Henry  among  them, 
smelt  the  taint  upon  the  bland  and  accomplished  Tory 
politician  and  pamphleteer.  Galloway  very  nearly 
smothered  the  Republic  at  its  birth. 

And  now  we  come  to  a  curious  matter  with  respect 
to  Henry  and  this  first  Congress.  He  served  on  various 
committees,  including  that  which  prepared  the  address 
to  King  George.  Why  he  should  have  been  placed 
upon  this  committee  is  hard  to  understand,  for  of  all 
men  he  was  the  least  likely  to  utter  obsequious  senti 
ments  or  seek  to  placate  ruffled  royalty.  The  first  report 
made  by  the  committee  was  sent  back  because  of  its 
"  asperity."  Some  of  this  "  asperity  "  may  have  been 
due  to  Henry's  talk  in  committee,  but  the  draft  of  the 
address  is  said  to  have  been  made  by  Richard  Henry  Lee, 
whose  labors  in  Congress  were  manifold.  About  this 
time  Dickinson  became  a  member,  and  it  was  he  who 
rewrote  the  address  as  adopted.  The  speculative  mind 
sees  many  piquant  possibilities  in  this  situation.  Per 
haps  some  one  inimical  to  Henry  wished  it  to  be  told 
among  the  Virginia  democrats  that  their  leader  had 
become  so  infected  by  the  Proprietary  poisons  of  Penn 
sylvania  as  to  write  to  the  King  in  apology  for  certain 
remarks  uttered  in  the  House  of  Burgesses.  But  the 
most  inviting  possibility  refers  to  Dickinson.  We  may 
assume  that  Henry — a  marked  man,  as  London  rumor 
had  it — was  unwilling  to  sink  his  spirit.  Dickinson, 
on  the  contrary,  was  ready  and  eager  to  sharpen  a  fresh 
quill  and  address  his  Majesty  with  all  the  elegant  genu 
flections  of  a  refined  rhetorician.  Who  knows  but  that 
the  sagacious  Samuel  Adams  and  the  sagacious  Patrick 
Henry  were  playing  politics  here?  According  to  Gal 
loway  :  "  While  the  two  parties  in  Congress  remained 

170 


ON  A  LARGER  STAGE 

thus  during  three  weeks  on  an  equal  balance,  the  republi 
cans  were  calling  to  their  assistance  the  aid  of  their 
factions  without.  They  were  under  the  management 
of  Samuel  Adams.  ...  He  eats  little,  drinks  little, 
sleeps  little,  thinks  much,  and  is  most  decisive  and  in 
defatigable  in  the  pursuit  of  his  objects.  It  was  this  man 
who,  by  his  superior  application,  managed  at  once  the 
faction  in  Congress  at  Philadelphia  and  the  factions 
in  New  England."  It  was  Adams  who  caused  Warren 
in  Boston  to  push  through  the  Suffolk  resolves,  and  it 
was  he  who  caused  them  to  be  brought  to  Congress  for 
approval.  Viewed  in  this  light,  it  is  allowable  to  think 
that  Adams  and  Henry  so  managed  the  address  to  the 
King  as  to  gain  a  point  for  America.  They  understood 
how  influential  Dickinson  was;  they  hoped  to  win  him 
over,  with  some  of  his  friends ;  and  they  realized  that  he 
would  be  hugely  flattered  personally  if  invited  by  Con 
gress  to  flatter  the  King. 

Samuel  Chase,  of  Maryland,  who  is  described  by 
Dr.  Benjamin  Rush  as  "a  bold  declaimer  with  slender 
reasoning  powers,"  was  so  affected  by  the  oratory  at 
the  opening  of  the  Congress  that  he  walked  across  the 
chamber  to  his  colleague's  seat  and  exclaimed :  "  We 
might  as  well  go  home ;  we  are  not  able  to  legislate 
with  these  men."  Later  he  amended  his  remark :  "  Well, 
after  all,  I  find  these  are  but  men — and,  in  mere  matters 
of  business,  very  common  men."  In  keeping  with  this 
thought  was  Jefferson's  reminiscent  echo  of  it,  when  he 
wrote  to  Wirt  that  Henry  lapsed  from  his  high  plane 
during  the  session  and  suffered  in  repute  because  of  the 
incident  of  the  address  to  the  King.  Now,  so  long  and 
stormy  was  Jefferson's  own  public  life,  and  so  varied 
were  his  mental  activities,  that  one  could  not  expect 
his  memory  to  serve  him  without  slips  and  tricks.  That 
it  played  him  tricks  he  himself  admits.  Writing,  in  his 
"  Autobiography,"  of  another  matter,  he  confesses  thus : 

171 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

"  This  idea,  after  a  lapse  of  twenty-six  years,  had  so 
insinuated  itself  into  my  mind  that  I  committed  it  to 
paper  without  the  least  suspicion  of  error."  Jefferson 
did  not  attend  the  First  Congress.  His  insinuation  that 
Henry's  work  was  inefficient  had  no  warrant  in  fact. 
He  misled  Wirt,  who  misapprehended  the  whole  matter, 
and  thereupon  proceeded  to  moralize  on  the  evil  results 
of  neglecting  one's  books  when  one  is  at  school.  Poor 
Patrick  is  again  held  up,  not  exactly  as  a  horrible  ex 
ample,  but  as  the  next  thing  to  it. 

Chase,  for  his  part,  was  justified  in  concluding  that 
a  man  might  be  a  wretched  speaker,  yet  live  to  legislate 
in  company  with  the  Virginians.  "  Lee,  Henry,  and 
Hooper  are  the  orators,"  said  Adams ;  as  for  the  states 
men  in  the  Congress,  they  were  more  numerous  than 
Adams  would  admit  when  he  wrote  to  his  wife :  "  Fifty 
gentlemen,  meeting  together,  all  strangers,  are  not  ac 
quainted  with  each  other's  language,  ideas,  views, 
designs.  They  are  therefore  jealous  of  each  other — 
fearful,  timid,  skittish."  We  have  seen  that  two  of  these 
men — Samuel  Adams  and  Henry — subdued  themselves 
at  the  start.  If  they  had  been  shallow  characters — if 
they  had  been  dominated  by  selfish  ambition,  each  would 
have  contrived  to  organize  a  following ;  each  would  have 
sought  to  rise  at  the  expense  of  the  cause.  If  they  had 
been  smaller  men,  they  would  have  antagonized  each 
other.  So  far  from  this,  they  became  warm  friends. 
It  is  not  allowable  to  assume  outright  that  there  was  an 
understanding  between  them,  but  such  an  assumption 
would  have  a  better  basis  than  Wirt's  assumption 
that  Henry  was  derelict  in  committee  work,  and  that 
he  was  no  writer.  As  heretofore  intimated,  one  of  the 
best  bits  of  data  with  respect  to  Henry  is  Judge  Tucker's 
telling  allusion  to  his  "peculiar  smile."  We  can  fre 
quently  see  it  influencing  such  of  his  muscles  as  had 
to  do  with  his  lips,  cheeks,  and  chin.  Very  often  we 

172 


ON  A  LARGER  STAGE 

think  of  this  sceptical  smile,  and  we  think  of  it  now — 
imagining  how  it  would  have  been  provoked  if  Henry 
had  lived  to  read  the  charge  that  he  had  not  the  gumption 
or  the  scholarship  to  address  the  King.  All  the  com 
ities  and  epistolary  courtesies  were  well  understood  by 
Henry,  and  he  knew  the  political  requirements  of  the 
occasion.  Why,  therefore,  should  he  have  been  slack 
in  duty  or  endeavor- — why,  indeed,  unless,  with  Sam 
Adams,  he  had  a  purpose?  As  for  composition,  Henry 
was  a  clear,  forceful,  and  convincing  writer.  At  times 
there  was  lack  of  flexibility;  his  style  was  never  florid. 
His  letters  show  a  sensible  directness.  Moreover,  an 
essay  of  his,  touching  Virginia  economics,  is  logical, 
direct,  and  lucid.  That  he  was  a  master  of  style,  like 
Dickinson,  or  Jay,  or  Richard  Henry  Lee,  no  one  would 
urge ;  but  his  ability  to  write  well  is  beyond  doubt. 

Throughout  the  session  Henry  must  have  been  a  busy 
man.  A  wide  range  of  knowledge  was  necessary  in 
developing  the  resolves  and  declarations  and  shaping 
the  course  of  revolt.  Numberless  intercolonial  and  in 
ternational  facts  were  digested  in  the  committees,  and 
accuracy  of  statement  was  attained  only  through  search 
ing  inquiry.  Henry  was  on  the  committee  that  reported 
upon  British  statutes  affecting  colonial  trade — no  easy 
task.  It  is  not  pretended  that  he  was  better  informed 
than  his  associates,  nor  even  that  he  was  as  well  informed 
as  some  of  them  on  various  points.  He  was  no  delver. 
He  had  little  useless  knowledge.  There  was  in  Phila 
delphia  at  that  time  one  George  Bryan — later  President 
of  the  Supreme  Executive  Council — who  was  supposed 
to  know  everything.  A  wag  bet  that  Bryan  could  name, 
off-hand,  the  town-crier  of  Bergen-op-Zoom.  Henry 
would  have  been  eclipsed  by  Bryan ;  nevertheless,  he 
held  his  own  in  Congress.  Finally,  the  papers  of  this 
body  leave  one  under  the  impression  that  they  were 
supervised  by  a  master.  Reading  the  first  drafts  of 

173 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

the  documents  and  then  the  revised  declarations  and 
resolves,  we  seem  to  see  behind  the  pen  that  made  the 
erasures  and  interpolations  the  figure  of  an  old  man, 
a  wise  man,  a  patriotic  man,  a  benign  genius.  Who 
was  he?  There  was  no  such  worthy.  The  wisdom 
was  that  conjoint  wisdom  so  generously  lauded  by 
Camden  and  Chatham.-  To  the  sum  of  this  wisdom,  as 
the  records  show,  Henry  contributed  a  goodly  share. 

Since  John  Adams  is  still  in  our  foreground,  it 
would  seem  to  be  appropriate  here  to  give  his  matured 
opinion  of  Henry,  as  expressed  in  a  letter  to  Wirt,  in 
1818.  He  wrote:  "From  personal  acquaintance,  per 
haps  I  might  say  a  friendship,  with  Mr.  Henry  of  more 
than  thirty  years,  and  from  all  that  I  have  heard  or 
read  of  him,  I  have  always  considered  him  a  gentleman 
of  deep  reflection,  keen  sagacity,  clear  foresight,  daring 
enterprise,  inflexible  intrepidity,  and  untainted  integrity, 
with  an  ardent  zeal  for  the  liberties,  the  honor,  and  the 
felicity  of  his  country  and  his  species." 

When  Henry  was  asked  by  a  Hanover  neighbor 
whom  he  esteemed  the  greatest  man  in  the  First  Con 
gress,  he  is  said  to  have  replied :  "  Rutledge,  if  you  speak 
of  eloquence,  is  by  far  the  greatest  orator,  but  Colonel 
Washington,  who  has  no  pretensions  to  eloquence,  is 
a  man  of  more  solid  judgment  and  information  than 
any  man  on  that  floor."  It  was  John,  not  Edward, 
Rutledge  whom  Henry  had  in  mind.  Of  Edward,  the 
censorious  Adams  wrote : 


"  Rutledge  is  a  very  uncouth  and  ungraceful  speaker ;  he 
shrugs  his  shoulders,  distorts  his  body,  nods  and  wriggles  with 
his  head,  and  looks  about  with  his  eyes  from  side  to  side,  and 
speaks  through  his  nose  as  the  Yankees  sing."  Again :  "  Young 
Ned  Rutledge  is  a  perfect  Bob-o-Lincoln — a  swallow,  a  spar 
row,  a  peacock ;  excessively  vain,  excessively  weak,  and  ex 
cessively  variable  and  unsteady;  jejune,  inane,  puerile."  .  .  . 
"  His  brother  John  dodges  his  head,  too,  rather  disagreeably, 

174 


ON  A  LARGER  STAGE 

and  both  of  them  spout  out  their  language  in  a  rough  and  rapid 
torrent,  but  without  much  force  or  effect." 

Evidently  Adams  permitted  his  political  dislike  of 
the  Rutledges  to  become  a  personal  matter.  'Not  so 
Henry,  who  was  at  least  generous  in  praising  the  ora 
torical  qualities  of  a  man  with  whom  he  differed  on 
public  questions.  One  of  the  entries  in  Adams'  "  Diary  " 
reads : 

"  Spent  the  evening  with  Mr.  Henry  at  his  lodgings,  consult 
ing  about  a  petition  to  the  King.  Henry  said  he  had  no  public 
education;  at  fifteen  he  read  Virgil  and  Livy,  and  had  not 
looked  into  a  Latin  book  since.  His  father  left  him  at  that 
age  [sic],  and  he  has  been  struggling  through  life  ever  since. 
He  has  high  notions,  talks  about  exalted  minds,  etc.  He  has 
a  horrid  opinion  of  Galloway,  Jay,  and  the  Rutledges.  Their 
system,  he  says,  would  ruin  the  cause  of  America.  He  is  very 
impatient,  to  see  such  fellows,  and  not  be  at  liberty  to  describe 
them  in  their  true  colors." 

Henry  is  seen  over  the  diarist's  shoulder  at  Judge 
Willing's,  Dr.  Cadwalader's,  and  other  houses  where 
they  dined :  "  A  most  sinful  feast  again !  everything 
which  could  delight  the  eye  or  allure  the  taste ;  curds 
and  creams,  jellies,  sweetmeats  of  various  sorts,  twenty 
sorts  of  tarts,  fools,  trifles,  floating  islands,  whipped 
sillabubs,  etc.,  etc."  Even  at  a  "  plain  but  pretty " 
Quakeress's,  with  her  thees  and  thous,  "  beer,  porter, 
punch,  and  wine  "  were  to  be  had.  It  was  a  time  when 
a  guest  was  confronted  with  "  a  bowl  of  fine  Lemon 
Punch,  big  enough  to  have  Swimm'd  half  a  dozen  of 
young  geese."  Occasionally  the  feasters  were  in  great 
parties.  In  mid-September — the  week  of  the  departure 
of  the  Royal  Irish,  moving  off  towards  Boston  with 
tap  of  drum — Congress  was  entertained  at  a  banquet 
in  the  State  House,  five  hundred  gentlemen  partici 
pating.  On  the  2Oth  of  October,  the  Assembly  gave  a 

175 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

banquet  to  the  delegates,  both  bodies,  to  the  number 
of  one  hundred,  sitting  down  together.  This  final  feast 
was  at  the  City  Tavern.  Never  had  mine  host,  Daniel 
Smith,  a  more  glorious  company  under  his  roof.  His 
long  room  was  crowded.  Adams  describes  it  as  "  a 
most  elegant  entertainment."  "  A  sentiment  was  given," 
says  he :  "  '  May  the  sword  of  the  parent  never  be  stained 
with  the  blood  of  her  children.'  Two  or  three  broad 
brims  over  against  me  at  table  said :  '  This  is  not  a  toast, 
but  a  prayer ;  come,  let  us  join  in  it ! '  And  they  took 
their  glasses  accordingly." 

But  it  is  time  to  have  done  with  the  good  old  gossipy 
diarist,  who  says  he  was  "  avoided  like  a  man  infected 
with  the  Leprosy "  because  he  favored  independence, 
but  who  confesses  that  he  "  drank  punch  and  ate  dried 
smoked  sprats,"  and  consumed  oceans  of  syllabub  in 
conjunction  with  roast  duck. 

Once  more  the  members  of  the  First  Congress  met 
at  the  City  Tavern — this  time  to  say  farewell.  It  was 
on  the  evening  of  the  26th  of  October.  Thomson,  him 
self  a  sterling  soul,  said  of  them  that  they  were  "  the 
purest  and  ablest  patriots  he  had  ever  known."  "  28, 
Friday,"  writes  the  ex-Leper  who  had  been  cured  with 
syllabub,  "  took  our  departure,  in  a  very  great  rain,  from 
the  happy,  the  peaceful,  the  elegant,  the  hospitable  and 
polite  city  of  Philadelphia." 


176 


IX 


HENRY,  at  thirty-nine,  was  already  nearing  the  top- 
notch  of  his  greatness.  Still  fresh  to  fame,  his  powers 
matured,  his  zeal  under  discipline,  his  popularity  una 
bated,  he  may  now  be  regarded  as  at  his  strongest  and 
best.  Whether  viewed  as  a  far-seeing  statesman,  as  an 
orator,  or  as  a  patriot,  he  stands  out  more  admirably  at 
this  period  of  his  career  than  at  any  other.  His  polit 
ical  prescience  is  unquestioned.  He  was  the  prophet 
of  Independence  long  before  the  Declaration,  and  at 
least  a  year  before  he  deemed  its  open  advocacy  politic. 
On  this  point,  Nathaniel  Pope  wrote  to  Wirt: 

"  I  am  informed  by  Colonel  John  Overton  that,  before 
one  drop  of  blood  was  shed  in  our  contest  with  Great 
Britain,  he  was  at  Colonel  Samuel  Overton's  in  company 
with  Mr.  Henry,  Colonel  Morris,  John  Hawkins,  and  Colonel 
Samuel  Overton,  when  the  last  mentioned  gentleman  asked 
Mr.  Henry  '  whether  he  supposed  Great  Britain  would  drive 
her  colonies  to  extremities?  And  if  she  should,  what  he 
thought  would  be  the  issue  of  the  war?'  When  Mr.  Henry, 
after  looking  around  to  see  who  was  present,  expressed 
himself  confidentially  to  the  company  in  the  following  manner : 
'  She  will  drive  us  to  extremities — no  accommodation  will 
take  place — hostilities  will  soon  commence — and  a  desperate 
and  bloody  touch  it  will  be.'  '  But,'  said  Colonel  Samuel 
Overton,  '  do  you  think,  Mr.  Henry,  that  an  infant  nation,  as 
we  are,  without  discipline,  arms,  ammunition,  ships  of  war, 
or  money  to  procure  them — do  you  think  it  possible,  thus 
circumstanced,  to  oppose  successfully  the  fleets  and  armies 
of  Great  Britain  ? '  'I  will  be  candid  with  you,'  replied  Mr. 
Henry.  '  I  doubt  whether  we  shall  be  able,  alone,  to  cope  with 
so  powerful  a  nation.  But,'  he  continued  (rising  from  his 
chair,  with  great  animation),  'where  is  France?  Where  is 
Spain?  Where  is  Holland? — the  natural  enemies  of  Great 

12  177 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

Britain;  where  will  they  be  all  this  while?  Do  you  suppose 
they  will  stand  by,  idle  and  indifferent  spectators  to  the 
contest?  Will  Louis  the  XVI  be  asleep  all  this  while? 
Believe  me,  no.  When  Louis  the  XVI  shall  be  satisfied  by 
our  serious  opposition,  and  our  Declaration  of  Independence, 
that  all  prospect  of  reconciliation  is  gone,  then,  and  not  till 
then,  will  he  furnish  us  with  arms,  ammunition,  and  clothing; 
and  not  with  these  only,  but  he  will  send  his  fleet  and  armies 
to  fight  our  battles  for  us;  he  will  form  with  us  a  treaty 
offensive  and  defensive  against  our  unnatural  mother.  Spain 
and  Holland  will  join  the  confederation.  Our  independence 
will  be  established,  and  we  shall  take  our  stand  among  the 
nations  of  the  earth !  '  Here  he  ceased ;  and  Colonel  John 
Overton  says  at  the  word  '  independence,'  the  company  appeared 
to  be  startled;  for  they  had  never  before  heard  anything  of 
the  kind  even  suggested." 

Pope's  statement  was  accepted  in  his  own  day  and 
remains  unchallenged  to  this.  Henry  knew  that  he  was 
in  advance  of  most  men  on  the  subject  of  independence, 
and  when  in  public  kept  his  tongue  about  it.  He  was 
aware  that  Congress,  though  doubtful  of  the  issue,  was 
deluding  itself  in  the  hope  of  peace.  He  himself  had 
no  such  expectation.  He  foresaw ;  and,  foreseeing, 
waited. 

"  In  the  Congress  of  1774,"  wrote  John  Adams, 
"  there  was  not  one  member,  except  Patrick  Henry, 
who  appeared  to  me  sensible  of  the  precipice,  or  rather, 
the  pinnacle  on  which  he  stood,  and  had  candor  and 
courage  enough  to  acknowledge  it."  Again  Adams 
wrote : 

"  When  Congress  had  finished  their  business,  as  they 
thought,  in  the  autumn  of  1774,  I  had  with  Mr.  Henry,  before 
we  took  leave  of  each  other,  some  familiar  conversation,  in 
which  I  expressed  a  full  conviction  that  our  resolves,  declara 
tions  of  rights,  enumeration  of  wrongs,  petitions,  remonstrances, 
and  addresses,  associations  and  non-importation  agreements, 
however  they  might  be  expected  by  the  people  in  America 
and  however  necessary  to  cement  the  union  of  the  colonies, 
would  be  but  waste  paper  in  England.  Mr.  Henry  said 

178 


WE  MUST  FIGHT 

they  might  make  some  impression  among  the  people  of  Eng 
land,  but  agreed  with  me  that  they  would  be  totally  lost  upon 
the  Government.  I  had  but  just  received  a  short  and  hasty 
letter,,  written  to  me  by  Major  Joseph  Hawley,  of  North 
ampton,  containing  '  a  few  broken  hints,'  as  he  called  them, 
of  what  he  thought  was  proper  to  be  done,  and  concluding 
[Adams  should  have  said  "beginning"]  with  these  words: 
'  After  all,  we  must  fight.'  This  letter  I  read  to  Mr.  Henry, 
who  listened  with  great  attention;  and  as  soon  as  I  had  pro 
nounced  the  words,  '  After  all,  we  must  fight/  he  raised  his 
head,  and  with  an  energy  and  vehemence  that  I  can  never 
forget  broke  out  with,  '  By  G — d,  I  am  of  that  man's  mind.' 
I  put  the  letter  into  his  hand,  and  when  he  had  read  it,  he 
returned  it  to  me  with  an  equally  solemn  asseveration,  that 
he  agreed  entirely  in  opinion  with  the  writer.  .  .  .  The 
other  delegates  from  Virginia  returned  to  their  State,  in 
full  confidence  that  all  our  grievances  could  be  redressed. 
The  last  words  that  Richard  Henry  Lee  said  to  me,  when  we 
parted,  were,  '  We  shall  infallibly  carry  all  our  points ;  you 
will  be  completely  relieved;  all  the  offensive  acts  will  be 
repealed ;  the  army  and  fleet  will  be  recalled,  and  Britain  will 
give  up  her  foolish  project.' 

"  Washington  only  was  in  doubt.  In  private  he  joined  with 
those  who  advocated  a  non-exportation  as  well  as  a  non-im 
portation  agreement.  With  both  he  thought  we  should  prevail ; 
without  either  he  thought  it  doubtful.  Henry  was  clear  in  one 
opinion,  Richard  Henry  Lee  in  an  opposite  opinion,  and 
Washington  doubted  between  the  two.  Henry,  however, 
appeared  in  the  end  to  be  exactly  in  the  right." 

This  was  in  October.  November  found  Henry  back 
in  Virginia,  organizing  the  local  soldiery.  No  courts 
were  sitting;  no  Assembly  had  been  called;  Dunmore 
was  still  on  the  border,  and  the  colony  was  in  distress. 
Considering  his  recent  labors,  Henry  might  well  have 
remained  a  while  inactive.  Indeed,  sky,  trees,  and 
sedgy  fields  were  a  pleasant  sight  at  "  Scotchtown " 
plantation  house  in  autumn.  There  was  a  charm  in 
the  view  looking  north  from  the  stone-flagged  porch ; 
and,  of  a  morning,  deer  could  be  seen  at  the  edge  of 
the  forest.  But  there  was  no  allurement  in  these  things 

179 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

for  Henry.  He  could  not  dismiss  the  thought  of  Boston 
under  the  lion's  paw.  "  I  am  an  American,"  he  had 
said,  in  all  solemnity ;  and  that  other  expression,  which 
meant  so  much,  clung  like  a  mental  burr.  "  We  must 
fight,"  old  Hawley  had  concluded;  and  old  Hawley 
knew. 

Here  before  us  is  a  much-thumbed  letter,  written 
more  than  a  century  ago  by  Charles  Dabney,  a  Hanover 
man.  who  says : 

"  Soon  after  Mr.  Patrick  Henry's  return  from  the  First 
Congress,  notice  was  given  through  his  means  to  the  militia 
of  Hanover,  to  attend  at  Mr.  Smith's  tavern  (Merry  Oaks) 
in  the  neighborhood  of  Hanover  Court-house,  where  he  wished 
to  communicate  something  to  them  of  great  importance. 
Accordingly  a  considerable  number  of  the  younger  part  of 
the  militia  attended,  and  he  addressed  them  in  a  very  animated 
speech,  pointing  out  the  necessity  of  our  having  recourse  to 
arms  in  defence  of  our  rights,  and  recommending  in  strong 
terms  that  we  should  immediately  form  ourselves  into  a 
volunteer  company." 

By  "  strong  terms  "  we  take  it  that  Henry  put  a  lively 
interpretation  upon  the  words  of  Congress,  which  body 
had  admonished  the  people  to  be  "  in  all  respects  pre 
pared  for  every  emergency."  At  any  rate,  the  Independ 
ent  Company  of  Hanover  was  formed  at  Merry  Oaks, 
and  about  the  same  time  the  County  Committee,  which 
was  to  execute  the  plans  of  Congress,  came  into  being. 
Such  committees  were  organized  in  the  other  counties 
of  Virginia ;  but  it  is  not  true  that  soldiers  were  enlisted 
in  all  of  them,  as  Dunmore  asserted  at  Christmas,  and 
as  Rives  repeated  when  he  took  Wirt  to  task  for  over 
stating  the  apathetic  conditions  prevailing  in  the  colony 
prior  to  Henry's  tremendous  outburst  in  St.  John's 
Church,  on  the  23d  of  March,  1775.  Wirt  felt  that 
he  held  a  brief  for  Henry ;  he  had  but  lately  permitted 
Jefferson's  shadow  to  fall  upon  his  pages;  and  the 

180 


WE  MUST  FIGHT 

truth  is  that  he  did  lay  too  much  stress  upon  the  diffi 
culties  of  his  hero,  thereby  magnifying  the  achievement 
in  St.  John's.  But  it  was  rhetorical  stress  purely.  A 
microscopic  study  of  the  records  demonstrates  Vir 
ginia's  unarmed  condition  at  that  time.  In  not  more 
than  seven  counties  had  minute-men  been  enrolled. 
This  whole  fall  and  winter  the  Revolution  hung  fire. 
Not  that  the  Sons  of  Liberty  were  idle.  Not  that 
advanced  Whigs  anywhere  had  ceased  to  feel  concern. 
Certainly  not  that  there  was  lack  of  preparation  in  New 
England,  in  the  Middle  Colonies,  and  in  the  Carolinas. 
Peter  Force,  in  his  "  American  Archives,"  produces 
pages  of  evidence  that  the  people  were  wide  awake. 
He  presents  hundreds  of  letters,  addresses,  memorials, 
handbills,  reports  of  meetings,  pledges,  recantations, 
and  patriotic  resolves — colony,  county,  and  town.  In  a 
small  way,  there  were  "  many  hot  and  furious  proceed 
ings/'  In  lieu  of  actual  government,  the  people  man 
aged  affairs.  It  was  the  reign  of  the  Committee.  But 
the  fact  remains  that  most  men  did  not  expect  the 
"  desperate  and  bloody  touch "  foretold  by  Henry. 
They  had  freighted  with  their  hopes  the  ship  that  sailed 
with  what  we  may  now  call  the  ultimatum  of  Congress. 
All  sentiment  aside,  they  could  not  think  it  possible 
that  a  rational  people  like  the  English  would  permit 
the  destruction  of  a  vast  trade,  and  so  they  did  not 
believe  that  the  worst  would  come  to  the  worst.  If 
they  had  known  what  was  happening  over-sea,  they 
would  have  disillusionized  themselves  most  precipi 
tately.  But  they  did  not  know.  By  order  of  the  House 
of  Commons,  Tom  Paine's  hated  "  Crisis "  had  been 
lt  burnt  by  the  common  hangman  "  at  the  Royal  Ex 
change,  but  of  this  and  similar  incidents  they  were 
ignorant.  They  were  unaware  of  the  King's  uncom 
promising  words  in  Cabinet  Council  on  tlwv^th  of 
January;  of  Chatham's  efforts  in  their  behalf  on  the 

181 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

2Oth ;  and  of  Burke's  glorious  plea  on  the  22d  of  March. 
Master  alike  of  argument  and  eloquence,  Burke  fought 
the  enemies  of  America  point  by  point,  hour  after  hour, 
as  if  his  own  life  were  at  stake  in  the  combat,  and  he 
went  down  only  because  they  overwhelmed  him  with 
numbers.  To  every  argument,  their  answer  was  like 
that  of  the  man  in  Lord  Camden's  parallel :  "  Sir,  here 
is  my  sword !  " 

There  is  a  subject  for  some  poet  in  the  fact  that 
Henry's  greatest  oration,  on  the  23d  of  March,  was 
almost  simultaneous  in  its  delivery  with  that  of  Burke. 
Three  thousand  miles  apart,  one  genius  ceased  but  a 
few  hours  before  the  other  began.  Their  theme  was 
the  same.  If  it  be  that  their  voices  sounded  aloft  where 
Destiny  sits,  how  plain  must  it  have  appeared  in  high 
quarters  that  a  crisis  had  come  upon  the  world,  mark 
ing  an  extraordinary  turn,  an  upheaval,  the  incoming  of 
an  era  fruitful  of  change,  not  in  one  land  alone,  but  in 
many  lands. 

Uninformed  as  they  were  with  respect  to  British 
developments  since  Christmas,  the  members  of  the 
Second  Revolutionary  Convention  of  Virginia  met  in 
Richmond  on  the  2Oth  of  March.  Henry  and  Syme 
represented  the  freeholders  of  Hanover.  All  told, 
sixty-one  counties  and  three  corporations  sent  dele 
gates,  who  numbered  one  hundred  and  twenty.  Each 
of  these  men  was  in  some  degree  committed  to  the 
patriot  cause.  But  many  were  of  the  opinion  that 
there  would  be  no  war.  They  had  been  lulled  into  a 
feeling  of  security  by  the  latest  London  news  item, 
which  read  r  "  The  buzz  at  Court  is  that  all  the  acts 
will  be  repealed,  except  the  Admiralty  and  Declaratory, 
and  that  North  and  Dartmouth  will  be  replaced  by 
Gower^and  Hillsborough."  The  Convention  sat  for 
seven  c^l^ It  approved  ofVy*i.iat  Congress  had  done; 
thanke^the  Virginia  deputies ;  reappointed  them ;  took 
^^  182 


WE  MUST  FIGHT 

steps  to  curb  the  royal  power  in  the  matter  of  colony 
land,  and  transacted  other  public  business. 

But  the  great  event  of  the  week  had  to  do  with  the 
arming  of  the  colony.  Consideration  of  this  prime  and 
significant  matter  was  precipitated  on  Thursday,  the 
23d,  by  Henry  and  Lee,  who  resented,  or  affected  to 
resent,  an  adulatory  phrase  in  a  proposed  resolution 
of  thanks  to  the  Assembly  of  the  Island  of  Jamaica. 
The  Jamaica  Assembly,  sympathizing  with  the  Ameri 
cans,  had  sent  an  address  to  the  King;  and,  in  the 
resolution  of  thanks  to  the  West  Indians,  it  was  said 
that  the  Virginians  ardently  wished  to  see  "  a  speedy 
return  to  those  halcyon  days  when  we  lived  a  happy 
people." 

Here  was  Henry's  opportunity.  At  once  he  arose, 
and  offered  an  amendment  to  the  Jamaica  resolutions 
in  the  following  words: 

"Resolved,  That  a  well-regulated  militia,  composed  of  gentle 
men  and  yeomen,  is  the  natural  strength  and  only  security  of 
a  free  government ;  that  such  a  militia  in  this  colony  would 
forever  render  it  unnecessary  for  the  mother  country  to  keep 
among  us,  for  the  purpose  of  our  defence,  any  standing  army 
of  mercenary  forces,  always  subversive  of  the  quiet  and 
dangerous  to  the  liberties  of  the  people,  and  would  obviate  the 
necessity  of  taxing  us  for  their  support. 

"Resolved,  That  the  establishment  of  such  a  militia  is  at 
this  time  peculiarly  necessary,  by  the  state  of  our  laws  for  the 
protection  and  defence  of  the  country,  some  of  which  have 
already  expired,  and  others  will  shortly  do  so ;  and  that  the 
known  remissness  of  the  Government  in  calling  us  together 
in  a  legislative  capacity  renders  it  too  insecure,  in  this  time 
of  danger  and  distress,  to  rely  that  opportunity  will  be  given 
of  renewing  them  in  general  assembly,  or  maidng  any  pro 
vision  to  secure  our  inestimable  rights  and  liberties  from 
those  further  violations  with  which  they  are  threatened. 

"  Resolved,  therefore,  That  this  colony  be,  immediately  put,, 
into  a  posture  of  defence ;   and  that     ...     be  , a   committee 
to  prepare  a  plan  for  embodying,  arming,  and  disciplining  such 
a  number  of  men  as  may  be  sufficient  for  that  purpose." 

183 


. 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

Now,  the  sting  of  this  excellent  scorpion  was  in  its 
tail.  No  one  could  be  deeply  moved  by  the  ironical  and 
argumentative  first  resolution.  Indeed,  while  it  was 
being  read,  many  members  must  have  recognized  it  as 
a  paraphrase  of  the  chief  of  fourteen  patriotic  resolves 
adopted  at  Annapolis  on  the  8th  of  December  preced 
ing.  Had  not  Washington  copied  it  for  use  at  the 
Fairfax  County  Convention?  Nor  was  there  much  to 
cavil  at  in  Henry's  second  resolve.  But  the  third,  as 
it  seems  to  us,  pointed  straight  towards  war. 

Moses  Coit  Tyler  does  not  think  that  the  resolutions 
in  themselves  were  sufficiently  warlike  to  provoke  such 
opposition  as  that  which  followed.  We  are  told  by 
Judge  St.  George  Tucker  that  there  was  "  an  animated 
debate,  in  which  Colonel  Richard  Bland,  Mr.  Nicholas, 
the  treasurer,  and  I  think  Colonel  Harrison,  of  Berke 
ley,  and  Mr.  Pendleton,  were  opposed  to  the  resolu 
tion,  as  conceiving  it  to  be  premature."  In  this  "  cluster 
of  names,"  Dr.  Tyler  shrewdly — perhaps  too  shrewdly 
— finds  "  some  clew  to  the  secret  of  their  opposition. 
It  was  an  opposition  to  Patrick  Henry  himself,  and  as 
far  as  possible  to  any  measure  of  which  he  should  be 
the  leading  champion."  Pendleton  was  in  rivalry  with 
Henry,  and  there  were  other  men  in  St.  John's  that 
day  who  would  have  profited  personally  by  his  discom 
fiture.  However,  when  all  is  said  on  this  score,  it 
remains  but  a  bit  of  plausible  speculation. 

Somewhat  speculative,  too,  is  Dr.  Tyler's  further 
suggestion  that  Henry  probably  interpreted  the  reso 
lutions  when  he  offered  them.  "  What/'  he  asks, 
"  was  that  interpretation  ?  In  the  true  answer  to  that 
question,  no  doubt,  lies  the  secret  of  the  resistance 
which  his  motion  encountered.  For,  'down  to  that 
day,  no  public  body  in  America,  and  no  public  man, 
had  openly  spoken  of  war  with  Great  Britain  in  any 
more  decisive  way  than  as  a  thing  highly  probable, 

184 


WE  MUST  FIGHT 

indeed,  but  not  inevitable.  Others  had  said,  '  The  war 
must  come,  and  will  come — unless  certain  things  are 
done.'  .  Patrick  Henry,  brushing  away  every  prefix 
or  suffix  of  uncertainty,  every  half-despairing  '  if/ 
every  fragile  and  pathetic  '  unless/  exclaimed,  in  the 
hearing  of  all  men :  '  Why  talk  of  things  being  now 
done  which  can  avert  the  war?  Such  things  will  not 
be  done.  The  war  is  coming:  it  has  come  already/ 
Accordingly,  other  conventions  in  the  colonies,  in  adopt 
ing  similar  resolutions,  had  merely  announced  the  prob 
ability  of  war.  Patrick  Henry  would  have  this  con 
vention,  by  adopting  his  resolutions,  virtually  declare 
war  itself.  In  this  alone,  it  is  apparent,  consisted  the 
real  priority  and  offensiveness  of  Patrick  Henry's  posi 
tion  as  a  revolutionary  statesman  on  the  23d  of  March, 
1775.  In  this  alone  were  his  resolutions  '  premature/ 
.  .  .  Patrick  Henry  demanded  of  the  people  of  Vir 
ginia  that  they  should  treat  all  further  talk  of  peace 
as  mere  prattle ;  that  they  should  seize  the  actual  situ 
ation  by  a  bold  grasp  of  it  in  front ;  that,  looking  upon 
the  war  as  a^act,  they  should  instantly  proceed  to  get 
ready  for  it.  And  therein,  once  more,  in  revolutionary 
ideas,  was  Patrick  Henry  one  full  step  in  advance  of 
his  contemporaries.  Therein,  once  more,  did  he  justify 
the  reluctant  praise  of  Jefferson,  who  was  a  member 
of  that  convention,  and  who,  nearly  fifty  years  after 
wards,  said  concerning  Patrick  Henry  to  a  great  states 
man  from  Massachusetts :  '  After  all,  it  must  be 
allowed  that  he  was  our  leader  in  the  measures  of  the 
Revolution  in  Virginia,  and  in  that  respect  more  is 
due  to  him  than  to  any  other  person.  .  .  .  He  left 
us  all  far  behind/  " 

One  cannot  but  endorse  Dr.  Tyler's  accurate  and 
admirable  survey  of  Henry's  attitude,  whatever  one 
may  think  of  his  prior  assumption  that  Virginia  was 
awake  before  Henry  awoke  her.  Admitted  that  Wirt 

185 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

somewhat  overstates  the  dubiety,  the  unreadiness,  and 
the  obstructive  spirit  of  the  "  peace  party,"  Dr.  Tyler 
as  certainly  understates  that  party's  antagonism  to  the 
resolutions.  Wirt  uses  the  art  of  contrast ;  Tyler 
argues ;  and  neither  of  them  does  justice  to  the  scene 
in  St.  John's.  In  fine,  it  is  impossible  to  do  justice  to 
it.  With  respect  to  the  opposition,  it  is  true  that 
Washington  was  not  temporizing ;  it  is  true  that  Richard 
Henry  Lee  was  no  longer  temporizing;  but  it  is  equally 
true  that  many  able,  earnest,  and  steadfast  Virginians 
had  permitted  themselves  to  become  downright  tem 
porizers.  War  almost  invariably  comes  as  a  surprise — 
a  shock.  People  believe  in  it  only  when  they  hear  the 
roar.  Virginia,  as  her  guardians  well  knew,  was  unpre 
pared  for  war.  But  why  talk  of  enrolments,  musters, 
cannon,  rifles,  cartouch-boxes,  and  saltpetre?  Spring 
was  at  hand ;  shad  were  running  in  the  rivers,  and  lo ! 
yonder  upon  the  sea  were  London  sails — no  doubt 
bringing  news  of  reconciliation. 

As  for  a  preliminary  speech  by  Henry,  he  may  or 
may  not  have  made  one.  He  did  not  need  to  make 
it.  No  man  was  a  better  actor.  By  his  very  manner 
of  offering  the  resolutions— by  his  tone,  by  his.  empha 
sis,  by  his  look,  he  could  have  said :  "  After  all,  we 
must  fight !  "  His  challenge  to  the  "  peace  party  "  may 
have  been  expressed  in  so  slight-  a  thing  as  a  bow,  a 
gesture.  Pendleton,  Bland,  Nicholas,  and  all  his  oppo 
nents  knew  him  and  knew  his  ways.  His  friends  and 
followers  understood  him.  They  needed  no  words  from 
him  to  comprehend  that  he  was  up  in  arms. 

On  that  day,  fortunately  for  us,  Judge  John  Tyler, 
Judge  St.  George  Tucker,  and  John  Roane  were  within 
hearing  of  Henry  when  he  spoke  in  behalf  of  his  reso 
lutions.  We  say  "  fortunately,"  since  otherwise  Wirt's 
account  of  the  speech  might  be  deemed  apocryphal. 
Wirt  himself  intimated  that  Burk's  summary  of  the 

186 


WE  MUST  FIGHT 

Stamp  Act  speech  was  "  apocryphal  " ;  and  it  would  be 
doubly  distressing  if  we  should  be  obliged  to  accept 
the  amiable  Grigsby's  opinion  that  much  of  Wirt's 
version  of  the  speech  in  St.  John's  was  out  of  Wirt's 
own  head.  But  Grigsby  was  hardly  right  in  this  par 
ticular  matter.  Though  Wirt  did  not  give  his  source  as 
to  the  text  of  the  speech,  here  is  a  supporting  chain  for 
him  made  up  of  good  sound  links : 

First,  we  know  that  Nathaniel  Pope  wrote  to  Wirt: 
"You  have  already  received  in  detail  the  celebrated 
speech  delivered  in  the  convention  held  in  the  church 
in  Richmond,  in  1775,  in  favor  of  taking  up  arms 
against  Great  Britain."  Next,  we  know  that  John 
Roane  verified  for  Edward  Fontaine,  in  1834,  "  the 
correctness  of  the  speech  as  it  was  written  by  Judge 
Tyler  for  Mr.  Wirt."  Therefore,  since  Judge  Tyler 
was  one  of  Wirt's  authorities  and  Judge  Tucker  another, 
we  need  not  be  concerned  as  to  the  authenticity  of 
Wirt's  report.  Two  more  reliable  men  than  Tucker  and 
Tyler  it  would  be  hard  to  name. 

Thus  far,  in  our  approach  to  the  hour  when  Henry 
made  his  master-stroke  in  oratory,  we  have  been  clear 
ing  the  way  for  ourselves.  Even  now  there  is  some 
thing  else  to  be  done,  for  we  ought  to  come  closer  to 
the  old  parish  church  of  St.  John's,  and  take  such  a  look 
at  it  that  it  will  be  real  to  us.  If  we  see  the  tree  where 
the  mocking-bird  sits,  'we  can  better  hear  the  song. 
The  church  was  less  famous  than  certain  other  colonial 
churches,  and  it  was  less  beautiful.  It  was  beautiful 
only  in  its  situation.  It  stood  then,  and  stands  now, 
on  the  top  of  Richmond  Hill,  whence  to  the  west  there 
was  a  clear  prospect  of  a  town  of  scattered  houses, 
dotting  other  hills,  and  to  the  south  the  river  James 
running  between  high  banks  over  a  rocky  bottom,  vis 
ible  even  afar  in  the  sun-sparkle  upon  the  rapids.  The 
building  was,  and  is,  a  frame  structure,  well  set  in  a 

187 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

grassy  and  embowered  yard.  In  Henry's  time  there 
was  a  clump  of  cedars  near  the  west  end  of  the  church 
— at  the  spot  where  George  Wythe's  unmarked  grave 
rebukes  the  millions  who  profit  by  his  genius  and  espe 
cially  by  his  tutelage  of  the  Expounder  of  the  Consti 
tution.  Young  Marshall  was  not  in  the  throng  of 
"  buckskins  "  and  gentry  in  scarlet  on  the  hill  that 
day,  but  his  father  was;  and  there  passed  in  through 
the  doorway,  then  on  the  south  side,  Washington,  Jef 
ferson,  the  Lees,  and  such  lesser  celebrities  as  Peter 
Muhlenberg,  who,  in  a  Valley  pulpit,  was  soon  to  stand 
forth  a  soldier,  like  a  soldier  clad.  In  the  pulpit  of  St. 
John's  at  this  moment  sat  Peyton  Randolph,  President 
of  the  Convention.  The  delegates  faced  him,  looking 
east,  Henry  being  in  the  third  pew  on  the  north  side. 
With  its  flat  ceiling,  the  long  and  narrow  auditorium 
had  no  especial  acoustic  excellences.  There  was  an  end 
gallery  for  spectators,  but  only  seating  space  in  the 
body  of  the  church  for  the  six-score  delegates.  Yet, 
since  by  and  by  people  would  cling  to  the  window  ledges 
looking  in,  we  may  assume  that  aisles  and  doorway 
likewise  were  crowded.  And  as  the  windows  were 
wide  open,  it  may  be  further  assumed  that  there  was 
fine  weather  abroad — a  late  March  benefaction  of  south 
erly  breezes  and  sunshine,  tipping  with  red  the  church 
yard  maples  and  awakening  a  fresh  and  responsive 
spirit  in  man. 

Richard  Henry  Lee  seconded  the  resolutions.  Soon 
Henry  spoke.  Now,  it  is  a  fact  that  Henry's  best 
phrases  were  minted  in  a  heat  generated  by  his  own 
mental  frictions.  Usually  a  preliminary  travail  marked 
the  struggle  of  his  spirit  to  express  itself.  First,  his 
own  fire  had  to  be  kindled  within  him;  and  when  this 
was  done,  the  right  thoughts,  the  right  words,  the  right 
gestures,  came  of  themselves — all  in  harmony,  all  in 
obedience  to  his  will,  which  was  now  the  absolute 

188 


WE  MUST  FIGHT 

master  of  theme,  of  voice,  of  manner,  of  audience.  On 
this  occasion  there  was  little,  if  any,  effort  at  the  start. 
No  doubt  he  was  keyed  to  his  best  endeavor.  He  must 
have  wrestled  with  himself  before  he  entered  the 
church.  Perhaps  he  had  thought  for  many  days  and 
nights  upon  the  step  he  was  about  to  take.  "  My  heart 
was  hot  within  me,  and  while  I  was  thus  musing  the 
fire  kindled,  and  at  the  last  I  spake  with  my  tongue." 
Here  is  what  he  said : 

"  No  man,  Mr.  President,  thinks  more  highly  than  I  do  of 
the  patriotism,  as  well  as  the  abilities,  of  the  very  honorable 
gentlemen  who  have  just  addressed  the  House.  But  different 
men  often  see  the  same  subject  in  different  lights;  and,  there 
fore,  I  hope  it  will  not  be  thought  disrespectful  to  those  gentle 
men  if,  entertaining  as  I  do,  opinions  of  a  character  opposite 
to  theirs,  I  should  speak  forth  my  sentiments  freely  and  without 
reserve.  This  is  no  time  for  ceremony.  The  question  before 
the  House  is  one  of  awful  moment  to  this  country.  For  my 
own  part,  I  consider  it  as  nothing  less  than  a  question  of 
freedom  or  slavery;  and  in  proportion  to  the  magnitude  of 
the  subject  ought  to  be  the  freedom  of  the  debate.  It  is  only 
in  this  way  that  we  can  hope  to  arrive  at  truth,  and  fulfil  the 
great  responsibility  which  we  owe  to  God  and  our  country. 
Should  I  keep  back  my  opinions  at  such  a  time,  through  fear 
of  giving  offence,  I  should  consider  myself  as  guilty  of  treason 
towards  my  country,  and  of  an  act  of  disloyalty  toward  the 
majesty  of  heaven,  which  I  revere  above  all  earthly  kings. 

"  Mr.  President,  it  is  natural  to  man  to  indulge  in  the  illusions 
of  hope.  We  are  apt  to  shut  our  eyes  against  a  painful  truth, 
and  listen  to  the  song  of  that  syren,  till  she  transforms  us 
into  beasts.  Is  this  the  part  of  wise  men  engaged  in  a  great 
and  arduous  struggle  for  liberty?  Are  we  disposed  to  be  of 
the  number  of  those  who,  having  eyes,  see  not,  and  having 
ears,  hear  not  the  things  which  so  nearly  concern  their  tem 
poral  salvation?  For  my  part,  whatever  anguish  of  spirit  it 
may  cost,  I  am  willing  to  know  the  whole  truth ;  to  know  the 
worst,  and  provide  for  it. 

"  I  have  but  one  lamp  by  which  my  feet  are  guided ;  and  that 
is  the  lamp  of  experience.  I  know  of  no  way  of  judging  of 
the  future  but  by  the  past.  And  judging  by  the  past,  I  wish 
to  know  what  there  has  been  in  the  conduct  of  the  British 

189 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

Ministry,  for  the  last  ten  years,  to  justify  those  hopes  with 
which  gentlemen  have  been  pleased  to  solace  themselves  and 
the  House.  JIs  it  that  insidious  smile  with  which  our  petition 
has  been  lately  received?  Trust  it  not,  sir;  it  will  prove  a 
snare  to  your  feet.  Suffer  not  yourselves  to  be  betrayed  with 
a  kiss.  Ask  yourselves  how  this  gracious  reception  of  our 
petition  comports  with  those  warlike  preparations  which  cover 
our  waters  and  darken  our  land.  Are  fleets  and  armies  neces 
sary  to  a  work  of  love  and  reconciliation?  Have  we  shown 
ourselves  so  unwilling  to  be  reconciled  that  force  must  be 
called  in  to  win  back  love?  Let  us  not  deceive  ourselves, 
sir.  These  are  the  implements  of  war  and  subjugation — the  last 
arguments  to  which  kings  resort.  I  ask  gentlemen,  sir,  what 
means  this  martial  array,  if  its  purpose  be  not  to  force  us  to 
submission?  Can  gentlemen  assign  any  other  possible  motive 
for  it?  {JHas  Great  Britain  any  enemy,  in  this  quarter  of  the 
world,  to  call  for  all  this  accumulation  of  navies  and  armies? 
No,  sir,  she  has  none.  They  are  meant  for  us ;  they  can  be 
meant  for  no  other.  They  are  sent  over  to  bind  and  rivet 
upon  us  those  chains'!  which  the  British  Ministry  have  been 
so  long  forging.  And  what  have  we  to  oppose  to  them?  Shall 
we  try  argument?  Sir,  we  have  been  trying  that  for  the  last 
ten  years.  Have  we  anything  new  to  offer  upon  the  subject? 
Nothing.  We  have  held  the  subject  up  in  every  light  of  which 
it  is  capable ;  but  it  has  been  all  in  vain.  Shall  we  resort  to 
entreaty  and  humble  supplication^  What  terms  shall  we  find 
which  have  not  been  already  exhausted?  Let  us  not,  I  beseech 
you,  sir,  deceive  ourselves  longer.  fSir,  we  have  done  every 
thing  that  could  be  done  to  avert  the  storm  which  is  now 
coming  on.  We  have  petitioned;  we  have  remonstrated;  we 
have  supplicated;  we  have  prostrated  ourselves  before  the 
throne,  and  have  implored  its  interposition  to  arrest  the  tyran 
nical  hands  of  the  Ministry  and  Parliament.  Our  petitions  have 
been  slighted ;  our  remonstrances7'  have  produced  additional 
violence  and  insult ;  our  supplications  have  been  disregarded ; 
and  we  have  been  spurned,  with  contempt,  from  the  foot  of  the 
throne.  In  vain,  after  these  things,  may  we  indulge  the  fond 
hope  of  peace  and  reconciliation.  There  is  no  longer  any  room 
for  hope.  If  we  wish  to  be  free ;  if  we  mean  to  preserve 
inviolate  those  inestimable  privileges  for  which  we  have  been 
so  long  contending;  if  we  mean  not  basely  to  abandon  the 
noble  struggle  in  which  we  have  been  so  long  engaged,  and 
which  we  have  pledged  ourselves  never  to  abandon  until  the 
glorious  object  of  our  contest  shall  be  obtained— we  must 

190 


THOMAS  CRAWFORD'S  "PATRICK  HENRY" 

(One  of  five  bronze   figures  surrounding  the  Washington  group   in   the  Capitol 
Grounds  at  Richmond.) 


WE  MUST  FIGHT 

fight !     I  repeat  it,  sir,  we  must  fight !     An  appeal  to  arms  and 
to  the  God  of  Hosts  is  all  that  is  left  us! 

"  They  tell  us,  sir,  that  we  are  weak — unable  to  cope  with  so 
formidable  an  adversary.  But  when  shall  we  be  stronger? 
Will  it  be  the  next  week,  or  the  next  year?  Will  it  be  when 
we  are  totally  disarmed,  and  when  a  British  guard  shall  be 
stationed  in  every  house?  Shall  we  gather  strength  by  irreso 
lution  and  inaction?  Shall  we  acquire  the  means  of  effectual 
resistance  by  lying  supinely  on  our  backs,  and  hugging  the 
delusive  phantom  of  hope,  until  our  enemies  shall  have 
bound  us  hand  and  foot?  Sir,  we  are  not  weak,  if  we  make 
a  proper  use  of  those  means  which  the  God  of  nature  hath 
placed  in  our  power.  Three  millions  of  people,  armed  in  the 
holy  cause  of  liberty,  and  in  such  a  country  as  that  which  we 
possess,  are  invincible  to  any  force  which  our  enemy  can 
send  against  us.  Besides,  sir,  we  shall  not  fight  our  battles 
alone.  There  is  a  just  God  who  presides  over  the  destinies  of 
nations,  and  who  will  raise  up  friends  to  fight  our  battles 
fof  us.  The  battle,  sir,  is  not  to  the  strong  alone ;  it  is  to  the 
vigilant,  the  active,  the  brave.  Besides,  sir,  we  have  no  election. 
If  we  were  base  enough  to  desire  it,  it  is  now  too  late  to 
retire  from  the  contest.  There  is  no  retreat  but  in  submission 
and  slavery.  Our  chains  are  forged.  Their  clanking  may  be 
heard  on  the  plains  of  Boston.  The  war  is  inevitable.  And 
let  it  come !  I  repeat  it,  sir ;  let  it  come !  • 

"  It  is  in  vain,  sir,  to  extenuate  the  matter.  Gentlemen 
may  cry  peace,  peace — but  there  is  no  peace.  The  war  is 
actually  begun !  The  next  gale  that  sweeps  from  the  north 
will  bring  to  our  ears  the  clash  of  resounding  arms !  Our 
brethren  are  already  in  the  field!  Why  stand  we  idle  here? 
What  is  it  that  gentlemen  wish?  What  would  they  have?  Is 
life  so  dear,  or  peace  so  sweet,  as  to  be  purchased  at  the 
price  of  chains  and  slavery  ?  Forbid  it,  Almighty  God !  I 
know  not  what  course  others  may  take,  but  as  for  me,  give 
me  liberty,  or  give  me  death !  " 

No  applause  followed.  For  some  seconds  there  was 
silence.  Henry's  former  opponents  were  dumb ;  and 
they  were  without  the  wish  to  be  otherwise  than  dumb. 
He  had  made  every  one  present  feel  as  he  felt,  and 
that  feeling  was  of  the  most  solemn  nature. y  Moses  Coit 
Tyler,  usually  so  just  and  careful,  speaks  of  Patrick 

191 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

Henry's  "  individual  declaration  of  war,"  but  the  dele 
gates  did  not  so  regard  it.  Francis  Scott  Oliver,  in  his 
"  Alexander  Hamilton,"  mentions  "  the  heroics  of 
Henry " ;  but  those,  in  St.  John's  Church  who  per 
mitted  themselves  to  be  swayed  in  a  life-or-death  matter 
were  undoubtedly  men  of  sound  sense,  altogether 
immune  to  fustian.  Of  course,  a  perfervid  utterance, 
made  under  stress,  is  apt  to  suffer  in  commonplace  times, 
especially  when  it  becomes  as  hackneyed  as  the  final 
phrase  in  Henry's  speech.  For  more  than  a  hundred 
years  the  humorists  have  played  upon  this  phrase. 

It  may  be  said,  too,  that  one  who  now  reads  the 
speech  fails  to  find  it  provocative  of  expected  thrills. 
Some  of  the  passages  certainly  sing  in  the  mind — such, 
for  example,  as  the  beautiful  interrogation :  "  Is  life 
so  dear,  or  peace  so  sweet,  as  to  be  purchased  at  the 
price  of  chains  and  slavery  ?  "  It  is  a  bit  of  melody  as 
from  an  old  fife  at  Lexington ;  it  is  simple ;  it  is  strong ; 
it  compacts  in  a  few  Saxon  words  the  whole  story  of 
the  Revolutionary  struggle. 

But  in  our  search  for  the  secret  of  his  impressiveness 
we  are  not  to  turn  the  light  upon  Patrick  Henry's 
printed  words  alone.  When  the  orations  of  Demos 
thenes  are  read,  they  also  fail  to  evoke  their  due  of 
admiration.  All  effective  oratory,  as  this  ancient  worthy 
tells  us,  depends  upon  "  action,  action,  action  " ;  and  it 
was  because  the  orator  in  St.  John's  put  himself,  body 
and  soul,  into  his  part  that  he  struck  home — solem 
nized  the  hour,  made  his  hearers  exultant,  grim,  firmly 
resolved  at  last.* 

Judge  St.  George  Tucker  admits  that  now  for  the 
first  time  he  felt  "  a  full  impression  of  Mr.  Henry's 
powers.  In  vain,"  he  adds,  "  should  I  attempt  to  give 

*  The  resolutions  having  been  adopted,  a  Committee  of  twelve 
was  appointed.  Patrick  Henry  headed  it.  Washington  and 
Jefferson  were  members  of  this  Committee. 

192 


WE  MUST  FIGHT 

you  an  idea  of  his  speech.  .  .  .  Imagine  to  your 
self  this  speech  delivered  with  all  the  calm  dignity  of 
Cato  of  Utica;  imagine  to  yourself  the  Roman  Senate 
assembled  in  the  Capitol  when  it  was  entered  by  the 
profane  Gauls,  who  at  first  were  awed  by  their  presence 
as  if  they  had  entered  an  assembly  of  the  gods.  Imagine 
that  you  had  heard  that  Cato  addressing  such  a  Senate. 
Imagine  that  you  saw  the  handwriting  on  the  wall  of 
Belshazzars  palace.  Imagine  that  you  had  heard  a 
voice  as  from  heaven  uttering  the  words,  *  We  must 
fight,'  as  the  doom  of  Fate,  and  you  may  have  some 
idea  of  the  speaker,  the  assembly  to  whom  he  addressed 
himself,  and  the  auditory,  of  which  I  was  one." 

Another  listener,  a  Baptist  clergyman,  is  thus  quoted 
in  Henry  Stephens  Randall's  "  Life  of  Jefferson " : 

"  Henry  arose  with  an  unearthly  fire  burning  in  his  eye.  He 
commenced  somewhat  calmly — but  the  smothered  excitement 
began  to  play  more  and  more  upon  his  features,  and  thrill 
in  the  tones  of  his  voice.  The  tendons  of  his  neck  stood  out 
white  and  rigid  like  whipcords.  His  voice  rose  louder  and 
louder,  until  the  walls  of  the  building  and  all  within  them 
seemed  to  shake  and  rock  in  its  tremendous  vibrations.  Finally 
his  pale  face  and  glaring  eyes  became  terrible  to  look  upon. 
Men  leaned  forward  in  their  seats  with  their  heads  strained 
forward,  their  faces  pale  and  their  eyes  glaring  like  the 
speaker's.  His  last  exclamation — '  Give  me  liberty,  or  give 
me  death ' — was  like  the  shout  of  the  leader  who  turns  back 
the  rout  of  battle.  When  he  sat  down,  I  felt  sick  with  excite 
ment.  Every  eye  yet  gazed  entranced  on  Henry.  It  seemed 
as  if  a  word  from  him  would  have  led  to  any  wild  explosion 
of  violence.  Men  looked  beside  themselves." 

John  Roane's  account  of  the  scene,  as  preserved  in 
manuscript  in  the  library  of  Cornell  University,  is  rich 
in  details.  Roane  told  the  story  to  Edward  Fontaine, 
premising  it  with  the  remark  that  Henry's  "  voice, 
countenance,  and  gestures  gave  an  irresistible  force 
to  his  words,  which  no  description  could  make  intelli- 
13  i93 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

gible  to  one  who  had  never  seen  him,  nor  heard  him 
speak."     Roane  then  said: 

"  You  remember,  sir,  the  conclusion  of  the  speech,  so  often 
declaimed  in  various  ways  by  school-boys — '  Is  life  so  dear,  or 
peace  so  sweet,  as  to  be  purchased  at  the  price  of  chains  and 
slavery  ?  Forbid  it,  Almighty  God !  I  know  not  what  course 
others  may  take,  but  as  for  me,  give  me  liberty,  or  give  me 
dealj|i ! '  He  gave  each  of  these  words  a  meaning  which  is 
not  conveyed  by  the  reading  or  delivery  of  them  in  the  ordinary 
way.  When  he  said,  '  Is  life  so  dear,  or  peace  so  sweet,  as  to 
be  purchased  at  the  price  of  chains  and  slavery  ? '  he  stood  in 
the  attitude  of  a  condemned  galley  slave,  loaded  with  fetters, 
awaiting  his  doom.  His  form  was  bowed;  his  wrists  were 
crossed;  his  manacles  were  almost  visible,  as  he  stood  like 
an  embodiment  of  helplessness  and  agony.  After  a  solemn 
pause,  he  raised  his  eyes  and  chained  hands  toward  heaven, 
and  prayed,  in  words  and  tones  which  thrilled  every  heart, 
'  Forbid  it,  Almighty  God ! '  He  then  turned  toward  the  timid 
loyalists  of  the  House,  who  were  quaking  with  terror  at  the 
idea  of  the  consequences  of  partaking  in  proceedings  which 
would  be  visited  with  the  penalties  of  treason  by  the  British 
crown,  and  he  slowly  bent  his  form  yet  nearer  to  the  earth, 
and  said,  '  I  know  not  what  course  others  may  take/  and 
he  accompanied  the  words  with  his  hands  still  crossed,  while 
he  seemed  to  be  weighed  down  with  additional  chains.  The 
man  appeared  transformed  into  an  oppressed,  heart-broken,  and 
hopeless  felon.  After  remaining  in  this  posture  of  humiliation 
long  enough  to  impress  the  imagination  with  the  condition  of 
the  colony  under  the  iron  heel  of  military  despotism,  he  arose 
proudly,  and  exclaimed,  '  but  as  for  me ' — and  the  words  hissed 
through  his  clenched  teeth,  while  his  body  was  thrown  back, 
and  every  muscle  and  tendon  was  strained  against  the  fetters 
which  bound  him,  and  with  his  countenance  distorted  by  agony 
and  rage  he  looked  for  a  moment  like  Laocoon  in  a  death 
struggle  with  coiling  serpents ;  then  the  loud,  clear,  triumphant 
tones,  '  give  me  liberty,'  electrified  the  assembly.  It  was  not  a 
prayer,  but  a  stern  demand,  which  would  submit  to  no  refusal  or 
delay.  The  sound  of  his  voice,  as  he  spoke  these  memorable 
words,  was  like  that  of  a  Spartan  paean  on  the  field  of  Plataea ; 
and,  as  each  syllable  of  the  word  '  liberty '  echoed  through  the 
building,  his  fetters  were  shivered ;  his  arms  were  hurled  apart ; 
and  the  links  of  his  chains  were  scattered  to  the  winds.  When 
he  spoke  the  word  'liberty,'  with  an  emphasis  never  given  it 

194 


WE  MUST  FIGHT 

before,  his  hands  were  open,  and  his  arms  elevated  and  ex 
tended  ;  his  countenance  was  radiant ;  he  stood  erect  and  defiant ; 
while  the  sound  of  his  voice  and  the  sublimity  of  his  attitude 
made  him  appear  a  magnificent  incarnation  of  Freedom,  and 
expressed  all  that  can  be  acquired  or  enjoyed  by  nations  and 
individuals  invincible  and  free.  After  a  momentary  pause, 
only  long  enough  to  permit  the  word  '  liberty '  to  cease,  he 
let  his  left  hand  fall  powerless  to  his  side,  and  clenched  his 
right  hand  firmly,  as  if  holding  a  dagger  with  the  point  aimed 
at  his  breast.  He  stood  like  a  Roman  Senator  defying  Caesar, 
while  the  unconquerable  spirit  of  Cato  of  Utica  flashed  from 
every  feature;  and  he  closed  the  grand  appeal  with  the  solemn 
words  '  or  give  me  death ! '  which  sounded  with  the  awful 
cadence  of  a  hero's  dirge,  fearless  of  death  and  victorious  in 
death;  and  he  suited  the  action  to  the  word  by  a  blow  upon 
the  left  breast  with  the  right  hand  which  seemed  to  drive  the 
dagger  to  the  patriot's  heart." 

So  precise  is  this  description  that  no  one  need  find  it 
hard  to  reconstruct  the  orator,  put  him  on  his  feet  in 
the  third  pew  of  St.  John's,  and  hear  him  fill  the  space 
between  the  four  walls  with  transcending  eloquence. 
John  Roane,  indeed,  gives  us  the  very  shadow  of  a 
shade  and  traces  each  effect  to  its  vanishing  point ;  yet, 
even  in  his  particularity,  he  leaves  something  untold. 
Hence  there  is  room  for  Edmund  Randolph's  account 
of  the  scene.  Says  Randolph : 

"  The  fangs  of  European  criticism  might  be  challenged  to 
spread  themselves  against  the  eloquence  of  that  awful  day.  It 
was  a  proud  one  to  a  Virginian,  feeling  and  acting  with  his 
country.  Demosthenes  invigorated  the  timid,  and  Cicero 
charmed  the  backward.  The  multitude,  many  of  whom  had 
travelled  to  the  Convention  from  a  distance,  could  not  suppress 
their  emotion.  Henry  was  his  pure  self.  Those  who  had 
toiled  in  the  artifices  of  scholastic  rhetoric  were  involuntarily 
driven  to  an  inquiry  within  themselves,  whether  rules  and 
forms  and  niceties  of  elocution  would  not  have  choked  his 
native  fire.  It  blazed  so  as  to  warm  the  coldest  heart.  In  the 
sacred  place  of  meeting,  the  church,  the  imagination  had  no 
difficulty  to  conceive,  when  he  launched  forth  in  solemn  tones 
various  causes  of  scruples  against  oppressors,  that  the  British 

195 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

King  was  lying  prostrate  from  the  thunder  of  heaven.  Henry 
was  thought  in  his  attitude  to  resemble  St.  Paul,  while  preach 
ing  at  Athens,  and  to  speak  as  a  man  was  never  known  to 
speak  before.  After  every  illusion  had  vanished,  a  prodigy 
yet  remained.  It  was  Patrick  Henry,  born  in  obscurity,  poor, 
and  without  the  advantage  of  literature,  rousing  the  genius 
of  his  country,  and  binding  a  band  of  patriots  together  to 
hurl  defiance  at  the  tyranny  of  so  formidable  a  nation  as 
Great  Britain.  This  enchantment  was  spontaneous  obedience 
to  the  working  of  the  soul.  When  he  uttered  what  commanded 
respect  for  himself,  he  solicited  no  admiring  look  from  those 
who  surrounded  him.  If  he  had,  he  must  have  been  abashed 
by  meeting  every  eye  fixed  upon  him.  He  paused,  but  he 
paused  full  of  some  rising  eruption  of  eloquence.  When  he 
sat  down,  his  sounds  vibrated  so  loudly,  if  not  in  the  ears, 
at  least  in  the  memory  of  his  audience,  that  no  other  member. 
not  even  his  friend  who  was  to  second  him,  was  yet  adven 
turous  enough  to  interfere  with  that  voice  which  had  so  recently 
subdued  and  captivated.  After  a  few  minutes,  Richard  Henry 
Lee  fanned  and  refreshed  with  a  gale  of  pleasure ;  but  the  vessel 
of  the  Revolution  was  still  under  the  impulse  of  the  tempest 
which  Henry  had  created.  If  elegance  had  been  personified, 
the  person  of  Lee  would  have  been  chosen.  But  Henry 
trampled  upon  rules,  and  yet  triumphed,  at  this  time  perhaps 
beyond  his  own  expectation.*  Jefferson  was  not  silent.  He 

*  Ben  Jonson's  estimate  of  Lord  Bacon  as  an  orator  comes 
to  mind  in  reading  the  various  opinions  of  Patrick  Henry's 
oratory :  "  There  happened  in  my  time  one  noble  speaker  who 
was  full  of  gravity  in  his  speaking.  No  man  ever  spoke  more 
neatly,  more  pressly,  more  weightily,  or  suffered  less  empti 
ness,  less  idleness  in  what  he  uttered.  No  member  of  his 
speech  but  consisted  of  its  own  graces.  His  hearers  could 
not  cough  or  look  aside  from  him  without  loss.  He  commanded 
where  he  spoke,  and  had  his  judges  angry  and  pleased  at  his 
devotion.  The  fear  of  every  man  that  heard  him  was  that  he 
should  make  an  end."  Speaking  of  Patrick  Henry,  David  S. 
G.  Cabell  says :  "  History  does  not  record  any  example  of  a 
greater  natural  orator.  He  was  not  an  orator  as  a  result  of  a 
long  and  elaborate  course  of  preparation.  The  loftiness  of  his 
nature,  his  strong  emotions,  his  possession  in  himself  of  every 
thing  noble  and  true  more  than  supplied  the  rhetorician's 
art.  .  .  .  The  same  embarrassment  at  the  beginning  of  his 
speeches  and  the  speedy  recovery  of  self-possession  has  been 

196 


WE  MUST  FIGHT 

argued  closely,  profoundly,  and  warmly  on  the  same  side.  The 
post  in  this  Revolutionary  debate  belonging  to  him  was  that 
at  which  the  theories  of  republicanism  were  deposited.  Wash 
ington  was  prominent,  though  silent.  His  looks  bespoke  a 
mind  absorbed  in  meditation  on  his  country's  fate;  but  a 
positive  concert  between  him  and  Henry  could  not  more 
effectually  have  exhibited  him  to  view  than  when  Henry  with 
indignation  ridiculed  the  idea  of  peace  '  when  there  was  no 
peace/  and  enlarged  on  the  duty  of  preparing  for  war.* 

"  The  generous  and  noble-minded  Thomas  Nelson,  who  now 
for  the  first  time  took  a  more  than  common  part  in  a  great 
discussion,  convulsed  the  moderate  by  an  ardent  exclamation, 
in  which  he  called  God  to  witness  that  if  any  British  troops 
should  be  landed  within  the  county  of  which  he  was  the 
lieutenant,  he  would  wait  for  no  orders  and  would  obey  none 
which  would  forbid  him  to  summon  his  militia  and  repel  the 
invaders  at  the  water's  edge.  His  temper,  though  it  was 
sanguine,  and  had  been  manifested  in  less  scenes  of  opposition, 
seemed  to  be  more  than  ordinarily  excited.  His  example 
told  those  who  were  happy  in  ease  and  wealth  that  to  shrink 
was  dishonorable." 

This   same   Thomas   Nelson  became   a   power  as  a 


related  of  two  other  great  orators,  Cicero  and  Henry  Grattan. 
Patrick  Henry  had  great  extempore  power,  and  was  never 
disconcerted  by  interruptions.  His  replies,  when  interrupted, 
made  on  the  spur  of  the  moment,  were  always  the  most  effective 
portions  of  his  speech.  His  dauntless  spirit  and  his  extem 
poraneous  power  enabled  him  to  rise  to  the  demands  of  every 
occasion.  .  .  .  His  language  was  simple,  clear,  and  strong; 
not  unlike  that  of  the  New  Testament.  He  had  a  fine  fancy, 
and  indulged  not  unfrequently  in  figures  of  speech.  He  was  a 
great  word  painter.  He  mirrored  nature  and  was  indeed  the 
Shakespeare  of  orators.  His  oratory  was  of  the  style  of 
Mirabeau  and  Chatham,  rather  than  that  of  Cicero  and  Burke." 
*  It  would  be  interesting,  in  high  degree,  if  we  could  follow 
Washington's  thoughts  as  Henry  spoke ;  and  it  would  be  of 
value  to  us  if  we  could  measure  the  orator's  influence  in 
strengthening  the  spirit  of  the  soldier  who  was  to  accept  the 
chief  burden  of  the  war.  But,  though  Washington  left  journals, 
he  left  no  "journal  intime"  He  was  not  a  self-analyst.  We 
have  no  subjective  Washington  indeed. 

197 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

patriot.  Once  he  gave  $200,000  to  the  cause,  and  again 
he  supplied  a  thousand  horses.  Another  of  Henry's 
listeners,  Mann  Page,  fed  Washington's  whole  army 
for  a  week  from  his  own  plantation.  Still  another, 
Colonel  Edward  Carrington,  lives  in  picturesque  story 
less  by  reason  of  his  own  high  valor  than  because  of  his 
connection  with  the  scene  at  St.  John's.  Having  perched 
himself  in  one  of  the  east  windows,  he  heard  Henry 
from  first  to  last.  When  he  sprang  down,  he  cried, 
with  emotion :  "  Let  me  be  buried  at  this  spot !  "  In 
the  year  1810  his  comrades  of  the  Revolution  cut  the 
turf  beneath  this  east  window,  and  Carrington's  tomb 
now  marks  the  place  where  he  consecrated  himself  to 
the  great  cause. 


198 


X 

AS    A    SOLDIER A    SET-BACK 

Six  weeks  after  his  burst  of  eloquence  on  Richmond 
Hill,  Henry  made  another  patriotic  speech — this  time  to 
men  in  hunting  shirts,  with  arms  in  their  hands.  "  Our 
first  overt  act  of  war,"  says  Jefferson,  "  was  Mr.  Henry's 
embodying  a  force  of  militia  from  several  counties, 
regularly  armed  and  organized,  marching  them  in  mili 
tary  array,  and  making  reprisal  on  the  King's  treasury 
at  the  seat  of  government  for  the  public  powder  taken 
away  by  the  Governor." 

Apparently  it  was  a  part  of  the  British  plan  to  smother 
rebellion  by  shutting  off  warlike  supplies  from  abroad, 
and  by  seizing  those  already  in  the  colonies.  Appar 
ently,  also,  Gage  in  Massachusetts  and  Dunmore  in 
Virginia  were  acting  in  concert.  On  the  i8th  of  April, 
Gage  sent  out  troops  from  Boston  to  destroy  the  mili 
tary  stores  at  Concord;  and,  in  stirring  sequence,  on 
the  1 9th  occurred  the  battle  of  Lexington.  A  long 
way  south,  next  day,  was  another  happening.  For  on 
Thursday,  the  2Oth,  a  body  of  marines  under  Captain 
Henry  Collins  furtively  left  the  armed  schooner  "  Mag 
dalen,"  at  Burwell's  Ferry  on  the  James ;  marched  by 
night  to  Williamsburg ;  entered  Spotswood's  quaint 
old  eight-sided  brick  Powder  Horn,  with  a  roof  as 
conical  as  an  Irishman's  hat;  loaded  fifteen  half-barrels 
of  gunpowder  into  Lord  Dunmore's  wagon,  and  made 
off  towards  their  vessel,  which  they  reached  by  day 
break.  When  the  sun  came  up,  that  same  Friday  morn 
ing,  there  was  an  explosion — not  of  the  raped  gun 
powder,  but  of  popular  wrath.  The  people  of  Williams- 
burg  gathered  on  the  green,  threatening  the  "  palace." 

199 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

Indoors  sat  Dunmore,  ill  at  ease.  To  his  Council,  he 
feigned  that  he  had  heard  rumors  of  a  slave-rising; 
therefore  he  had  felt  bound  to  secure  the  gunpowder. 
One  of  the  Council,  John  Page,  of  Rosewell,  took  sides 
with  the  populace,  which  caused  Dunmore  to  smash  his 
fist  down  on  the  table,  crying :  "  Mr.  Page,  I  am  aston 
ished  at  you !  "  This  was  the  Page  who  later  stripped 
the  Rosewell  window-panes  of  lead,  to  be  made  into 
bullets.  But  all  was  not  talk  in  Williamsburg  that 
morning,  for  some  of  the  citizens  armed  themselves, 
while  others  saddled  their  horses  and  rode  courier  with 
the  news.  "  The  alternative  was :  pay  for  the  powder 
or  fight  for  it."  Meantime,  Peyton  Randolph,  Robert 
Carter  Nicholas,  and  other  peacemakers  drew  from 
Dunmore  a  promise  that  the  gunpowder,  if  needed, 
should  be  brought  back  to  the  Horn.  But  next  day 
Dunmore  sent  word  that  in  case  the  people  dared  insult 
his  secretary,  Foy,  or  Collins  of  the  "  Magdalen,"  "  he 
would  declare  freedom  to  the  slaves  and  lay  the  town 
in  ashes."  If  he  had  been  in  his  senses,  Dunmore  would 
hardly  have  made  so  reckless  a  threat,  even  to  the 
savage  Shawanese,  at  whose  council-fires  he  had  lately 
sat.  John  Connolly,  the  Virginia  antithesis  of  Patrick 
Henry,  testifies  that  his  lordship  went  four  hundred 
miles  on  foot  during  his  progress  along  the  border. 
Connolly  himself,  as  Dunmore's  agent,  travelled  four 
thousand  miles  to  arrange  that  the  tomahawk  should 
reach  the  back-door  of  the  Americans  just  in  the  nick 
of  the  coming  of  the  British  bayonet  at  the  front-door. 
Perhaps  this  barbarous  matter  was  upon  his  lordship's 
mind,  unsteadying  it,  so  that  when  driven  to  make 
threats  he  threatened  foolishly.  But  whether  troubled 
in  conscience  or  by  cowardice,  Dunmore  from  this 
time  on  played  the  part  of  a  weakling. 

Two  sets  of  couriers  were  now  well  out  from  Wil 
liamsburg — those   whose  business   it  was   to   serve   as 

200 


AS  A  SOLDIER 

trumpets  of  rebellion,  and  those  who  followed  with 
reassuring  intelligence.  By  reason  of  the  activity  of 
the  first,  a  genuine  war-scare  ran  through  the  counties 
all  the  way  to  the  Blue  Ridge.  A  chief  rendezvous  was 
Fredericksburg,  and  by  the  27th  of  April  fourteen  com 
panies  of  light  horsemen  had  assembled  there.  More 
than  a  hundred  of  these  fledgling  troopers  met  in  coun 
cil.  They  sent  to  Mount  Vernon  to  get  Washington's 
advice,  and  perhaps  the  whole  force  would  eventually 
have  ridden  down  on  Dunmore  had  not  Peyton  Ran 
dolph  sent  them  word  that  the  tumult  was  over.  Thus, 
in  the  first  phase  of  the  gunpowder  episode,  we  have 
the  essentials  of  a  robust  comedy.  Nor  could  there 
be  a  finer  ghost  for  an  accompanying  moonlight  tableau 
in  front  of  the  old  octagonal  Powder  Horn  than  that  of 
its  builder,  Alexander  Spotswood,  who,  at  the  battle  of 
Blenheim,  was  hit  in  the  ribs  by  a  cannon-ball,  but  lived 
to  identify  himself  with  colonial  Virginia.  So  we  who 
lightly  review  the  Dunmore  episode  may  be  excused 
for  thinking;  but  in  reality  the  times  were  tragic,  and 
all  hearts  were  troubled  with  more  than  common  trouble. 
On  the  last  Saturday  of  this  very  month  of  which  we 
have  been  telling,  the  Virginia  Gazette  issued  a  special 
sheet,  giving  its  first  account  of  the  battle  of  Lexing 
ton.  Henry  must  have  heard  the  Lexington  news  about 
the  time  he  learned  with  chagrin  of  the  dispersal  of 
the  light  horsemen  at  Fredericksburg.  He  was  at  his 
"  Scotchtown  "  home,  preparing  to  ride  towards  Phila 
delphia,  where  the  Second  Congress  was  to  sit  on  the 
loth  of  May.  Instead  of  riding  North,  he  rode  South. 
Accounts  by  no  means  agree  as  to  his  first  impulses, 
calculations,  and  movements;  but  the  accepted  story  is 
that  he  deliberately  set  about  the  business  of  taking 
Dunmore  by  the  throat.  According  to  Wirt,  he  made 
up  his  mind  that  "  a  blow  must  be  struck  at  once  before 
an  overwhelming  force  should  enter  the  colony  " ;  that 

201 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

the  "  habitual  deference  and  subjection  which  the  people 
were  accustomed  to  feel  towards  the  Governor,  as  the 
representative  of  royalty,  and  which  bound  their  spirits 
in  a  kind  of  torpid  spell,  should  be  dissolved  and  dissi 
pated  ;  that  the  military  resources  of  the  country  should 
be  developed ;  that  the  people  might  see  and  feel  their 
strength  by  being  brought  out  together  " ;  in  a  word,  that 
the  Revolution  should  be  begun  in  Virginia  as  well  as 
in  New  England.  Moses  Coit  Tyler  thinks  that  the 
barren  muster  of  light  horsemen  at  Fredericksburg  was 
a  sore  disappointment  to  Henry ;  "  his  soul  took  fire 
at  the  lamentable  mistake  which  he  thought  they  had 
made."  William  Wirt  Henry  cannot  but  feel  that  it  was 
the  Lexington  news  which  stirred  him  to  immediate 
action.  To  Colonel  Richard  Morris  and  Captain  George 
Dabney,  Hanover  committeemen,  Henry  declared  that 
the  gunpowder  outrage  at  Williamsburg  was  a  "  fortu 
nate  circumstance  "  for  the  patriots.  It  would  arouse  the 
people  from  North  to  South.  Said  he :  "  You  may  in 
vain  mention  to  them  the  duties  on  tea,  and  so  on.  These 
things,  they  will  say,  do  not  affect  them.  But  tell  them 
of  the  robbery  of  the  magazine,  and  that  the  next  step 
will  be  to  disarm  them,  and  they  will  be  then  ready  to 
fly  to  arms  to  defend  themselves." 

As  ardent  as  Henry  himself  were  many  of  the  Han 
over  farmers,  and  they  shared  his  belief  that  the  moment 
was  opportune.  So  it  was  agreed  to  act  at  once.  Ex 
press  riders  were  sent  hot-foot  to  beat  up  the  volunteers, 
New  Castle  being  the  rendezvous  and  the  2d  of  May 
the  day  of  meeting. 

Now,  as  no  soldier  in  Henry's  gunpowder  army  tells 
us  about  this  old  town,  it  may  be  well  to  borrow  a  few 
lines  from  the  diary  of  William  Feltman,  one  of  Wayne's 
lieutenants,  who  campaigned  here  later  in  the  war. 
"  This  day  "  (August  18),  writes  Feltman,  "Lieut.  Col 
lier  and  self  took  a  walk  to  New  Castle ;  spent  the  after- 

202 


AS  A  SOLDIER 

noon  in  playing  billiards.  The  town  is  situated  on  a 
fine  plain ;  there  are  but  a  small  number  of  houses ;  the 
town  is  built  very  irregular.  .  .  .  There  are  a  few 
very  elegant  buildings.  A  few  of  us  bucks  remained  in 
town  all  night  at  the  onery ;  got  very  merry.  As  for 
watermelons,  this  county  is  full  of  them."  But  the 
watermelon  vines  of  Hanover  had  not  begun  to  run 
when  the  minute-men  of  the  two  parishes  hurried  to 
New  Castle  in  obedience  to  Henry's  summons.  En 
rolled  the  fall  before,  it  is  doubtful  whether  they  were 
as  yet  fully  organized.  They  gathered  around  Henry, 
and  the  speech  he  made  them  was  to  this  effect :  Who 
now  could  fail  to  see  the  British  plan?  It  was  first  to 
get  the  powder  and  the  guns.  They  had  tried  it  in  the 
North;  had  failed;  precious  blood  had  been  spilt  at 
Lexington.  They  had  tried  it  in  the  South — should 
they  be  permitted  to  succeed  ?  The  plunder  of  the  maga 
zine  at  Williamsburg  was  an  act  in  pursuance  of  the 
general  scheme  of  subjugation — a  flagrant  outrage  upon 
the  people  of  Virginia.  The  moment  had  come  to  say 
whether  they  chose  to  live  as  freemen  and  hand  down 
this  inheritance  to  their  children,  or  to  be  hewers  of 
wood  and  drawers  of  water  to  these  lordlings  who 
were  themselves  the  tools  of  a  corrupt  and  tyrannical 
ministry.  He  painted  the  land  as  it  would  be  under  the 
threatened  vassalage,  sparing  no  words ;  then  he  drew 
a  picture  of  America  as  it  should  be,  and  would  be,  if 
by  their  valor,  with  God  as  their  guide,  they  should 
strike,  and  strike  again,  and  still  strike,  till  at  last  their 
liberties  were  established.  No  time  was  to  be  lost.  As 
yet  their  enemies  were  few  in  number.  Now,  if  ever, 
a  body  blow  must  be  delivered. 

No  sooner  had  he  ended  than  the  volunteers,  much 
inflamed,  elected  him  their  captain,  pledging  themselves 
to  follow  wherever  he  might  lead.  Henry's  forward 
movement  was  immediate.  Detaching  Ensign  Parke 

203 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

Goodall,  with  sixteen  men,  to  go  to  Laneville,  in  King 
William  County,  and  demand  £330  of  Receiver-General 
Richard  Corbin  in  compensation  for  the  gunpowder, 
he  himself  took  the  Williamsburg  road  with  the  main 
body  of  his  volunteers.  On  the  night  of  the  3d  he 
camped  at  Doncastle's  Ordinary,  sixteen  miles  from 
the  capital.  There  Ensign  Goodall  reported.  He  had 
surrounded  Corbin's  house  at  night,  but  in  the  morning 
had  learned  that  Corbin  was  elsewhere.  However,  a 
message  from  Corbin  soon  reached  Henry,  and  next 
day  the  compensatory  sum  was  paid.  Finally,  letters 
passed  between  Henry  and  Robert  Carter  Nicholas  as 
to  whether  the  volunteers  should  escort  the  public  treas 
ury  to  a  less  tumultous  place  than  the  capital.  Treasurer 
Nicholas  expressed  doubt  as  to  "  the  propriety  of  the 
proffered  service  " ;  and  the  idea  was  abandoned. 

Henry's  main  object,  of  course,  had  been  attained. 
His  force  had  increased  by  constant  accessions,  and 
some  five  thousand  men  are  said  to  have  been  under 
arms.  At  his  bidding,  his  followers  dispersed.  Mean 
time,  Dunmore  had  planted  cannon  on  the  "  palace  " 
green,  had  sent  his  wife  on  board  the  man-of-war 
"  Fowey,"  and  had  ordered  up  marines  from  York. 
These  also  now  retired,  and  the  brief  campaign  was  over. 

Thus  far  the  accepted  account ;  but  was  there  ever 
in  the  history  of  man  a  narrative  of  a  military  operation, 
big  or  little,  that  did  not  give  rise  to  some  dispute 
between  its  surviving  participants?  Like  pigeons  in  a 
flock,  the  facts  never  alight  at  the  same  moment  and  at 
the  same  spot.  Some  of  them  are  sure  to  circle  wide 
and  perch  to  suit  themselves.  In  his  old  age  Samuel 
Meredith,  Henry's  brother-in-law,  dictated  a  curious 
memorandum  on  the  gunpowder  expedition.  Some 
manuscript  notes  left  by  Wirt  show  that  he  was  puzzled 
by  it.  These  notes,  with  others  by  Judge  Roane,  as 
well  as  statements  by  Nathaniel  Pope  and  George  and 

204 


AS  A  SOLDIER 

Charles  Dabney,  and  the  Meredith  manuscript  itself, 
are  all  here  before  us  now.  Colonel  Parke  Goodall 
told  Roane  that  the  Meredith  story  was  erroneous. 
George  and  Charles  Dabney  agree  that  Meredith  was 
not  in  full  commission  as  captain  of  the  Hanover  volun 
teers  when  the  troops  met  at  New  Castle.  No  wonder 
Wirt  concluded  that  "  in  the  course  of  thirty  years  " 
Meredith  "  may  have  confounded  the  order  of  events." 
Meredith  says  that  "  P.  Henry  knew  nothing  of  the 
first  meeting  or  first  movements  of  the  Hanover  volun 
teers.''  They  were  already  astir  when  Colonel  Syme 
despatched  a  letter  to  Henry,  then  actually  on  his  way 
to  Congress.  In  response  to  this  letter,  Henry  soon 
reached  New  Castle,  conferred  with  Meredith,  and 
agreed  to  address  the  company.  But  let  us  follow  this 
quaint  manuscript,  which  unfortunately  has  upon  it 
the  stain  of  dubiety  as  well  as  the  pleasing  dinginess  of 
more  than  a  hundred  years : 

"  When  he  [Henry]  retired  for  the  purpose  of  preparing  to 
go  and  address  the  Company,  it  was  proposed  by  S.  Meredith 
that  every  effort  should  be  made  to  induce  P.  H.  to  take  the 
command  of  the  Company;  that  they  stood  in  need  of  his  wis 
dom  to  direct  them,  and  of  his  eloquence  and  his  reputation  to 
protect  them  in  case  their  schemes  should  fail  or  be  dis 
approved.  This  proposition  met  with  universal  approbation 
It  was  accordingly  agreed  that  as  soon  as  P.  H.  should  finish 
his  address,  Colonel  M.  should  resign  in  his  favor,  that  they 
should  drown  all  his  objections  by  their  cries  of  approbation, 
and  that  he  should  be  forcibly  invested  with  the  Hunting  Shirt 
and  the  uniform  of  the  times — S.  M.  to  remain  second  in  com 
mand.  This  plan  was  carried  into  effect ;  for  as  soon  as  he  had 
finished  his  address  (and  an  elegant  one  it  was),  Colonel  M. 
resigned  the  command.  Colonel  [Edmund]  Winston  and  others 
clothed  P.  H.  in  the  Hunting  Shirt.  He  was  an  entire  stranger 
to  the  plan  till  the  moment  of  its  execution,  and  resisted 
their  importunities  as  long  as  he  could,  urging  the  necessity 
of  his  presence  in  Congress.  But  at  length,  finding  all  resist 
ance  vain,  he  yielded  to  their  entreaties,  and  declared  that  he 
would  not  refuse  to  execute  plans  which  had  been  sanctioned 

205 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

by  his  advice.  Afterwards  on  the  same  day  it  was  determined 
to  send  a  party  to  King  and  Queen  to  take  the  person  of 
Colonel  Corbin,  the  Receiver  General,  in  order  to  ensure  pay 
ment  from  the  money  of  the  Crown  for  the  military  stores 
taken  by  Dunmore;  but  strict  orders  were  given  to  do  no 
injury  to  his  person.  This  party  was  to  meet  the  main  body 
at  Armistead's  Tavern  in  New  Kent.  They  went  to  Colonel 
Corbin's,  but  he  was  from  home.  On  the  same  day  that  P.  H. 
was  elected  to  the  command,  the  Company  marched  on  to 
Park's  Spring;  from  thence,  the  next  day,  to  New  Kent  Court 
House,  where  they  were  met  by  Mr.  Norton,  a  son-in-law  of 
R.  C.  Nicholas,  sent  up  by  him  to  know  the  extent  of  the 
objects  of  the  volunteers,  which  by  this  time  had  been 
variously  conjectured  and  related;  for  the  people  in  Williams- 
burg  particularly  had  become  alarmed  at  the  great  force  which 
was  collecting  from  various  parts.  The  example  of  the  Han 
over  volunteers,  headed  by  a  man  of  P.  H.['s]  reputation, 
and  a  member  of  Congress,  had  excited  a  similar  spirit  in  the 
adjoining  counties.  Norton  was  prevented  by  P.  H.  from 
returning,  and  all  persons  travelling  towards  Williamsburg 
were  arrested  in  their  progress.  The  next  day  they  proceeded 
to  Doncastle's.  That  night  another  messenger  arrived  from 
Mr.  Nicholas,  as  the  Chairman  of  the  Common  Council  of  the 
City  of  Williamsburg,  with  the  information  that  Dunmore  had 
gone  on  board  the  man-of-war,  that  the  people  of  Williams 
burg  were  relieved  of  their  apprehensions,  and  praying  that 
the  volunteers  might  proceed  no  further.  The  next  day  the 
men  were  enrolled,  and  consisted  of  1500;  and  P.  H.,  in  answer 
to  Mr.  Nicholas,  sent  him  a  letter  by  Holt  Richardson  (with 
whom  Norton  was  permitted  to  return),  detailing  to  him  the 
objects  of  the  volunteers,  and  requesting  a  valuation  of  the 
military  stores,  etc.  Richardson  returned  with  the  valuation, 
amounting  to  about  £360  sterling,  and  in  his  company,  or 
very  shortly  after  him,  came  Mr.  Carter  Braxton,  who  was  the 
son-in-law  of  Colonel  Corbin.  He  informed  P.  H.  that 
Colonel  Corbin  had  been  made  acquainted  with  the  objects  of 
the  volunteers,  and  sent  him  to  make  satisfaction  for  the 
military  stores  according  to  their  valuation;  and  tendered  bills 
drawn  by  Corbin  on  Hanberry  of  London,  which  were  refused 
by  P.  H.,  altho'  Braxton  offered  to  indorse  them.  Braxton 
was  much  mortified,  and  expressed  his  surprise  that  he  should 
be  refused  as  indorser  for  so  small  a  sum  as  £360  sterling. 
P.  H.  acted  in  such  a  manner  as  to  convince  Mr.  Braxton  that 
he  refused  him  as  indorser  because  he  was  suspicious,  not  of 

206 


AS  A  SOLDIER 

his  ability  to  pay,  but  of  his  political  attachments.  He  certainly 
treated  him  with  great  coolness  and  reserve,  for  he  was  writing 
at  the  time  Mr.  Braxton  first  entered  the  room,  and  Samuel 
Meredith,  who  was  present  during  the  whole  interview,  is  not 
certain  that  Mr.  H.  rose  from  his  chair.  P.  H.  told  Mr. 
Braxton  that  Dunmore  had  already  gone  on  board  the  man- 
of-war,  and  was  ready  to  protect  and  carry  off  any  person  or 
persons  friendly  to  his  views;  that  Corbin,  his  father-in-law, 
was  agent  of  the  Crown,  and  he,  C.  B.,  was  the  agent  of 
Corbin,  giving  him  thus  clearly  to  understand  that  he  was 
fearful  the  Drawer  and  indorser  of  the  Bill  might  disappear 
with  Dunmore;  and  thus  the  main  object  of  the  volunteers, 
compensation  for  the  arms,  etc.,  [would]  be  defeated.  Colonel 
Meredith  is  positive  that  the  cool  treatment  Braxton  received 
from  P.  H.  arose  altogether  from  the  suspicions  entertained 
of  B.  by  P.  H.,  and  that  his  suspicions  had  been  excited  by  no 
other  cause  than  the  near  connexion  existing  between  Braxton 
and  Colonel  Corbin,  who  was  agent  of  the  Crown,  and 
therefore  he  (Corbin)  was  suspected  by  Mr.  H.  Mr. 
Braxton  had  not  then  given  the  evidence  which  his  subse 
quent  conduct  afforded,  of  his  attachment  to  the  cause  of 
the  Revolution.  P.  H.,  in  a  private  conversation  with  S. 
Meredith,  after  C.  Braxton  retired,  did  not  hesitate  to  de 
clare  to  him  the  reason  of  his  conduct  towards  Braxton  and 
the  nature  and  cause  of  his  suspicions.  He  informed  Mr.  B. 
before  he  retired  that  he  would  take  as  indorser  any  responsi 
ble  character  of  known  attachment  to  the  Revolutionary  cause. 
On  Carter  B.  mentioning  Colonel  Nelson,  P.  H.  said  he  would 
receive  him  very  willingly.  Some  time  after,  Colonel  Nelson 
arrived  at  Doncastle's.  Mr.  B.  was  with  him,  but  whether  Mr. 
Braxton  had  gone  to  Williamsburg  for  him,  or  met  him  on  the 
way,  or  whether  Mr.  Nelson  found  Mr.  Braxton  at  Doncastle's, 
is  not  certain  in  the  recollection  of  Samuel  Meredith.  As  soon 
as  P.  H.  heard  of  the  arrival  of  Colonel  Nelson,  he  ran  out  of 
the  house,  bareheaded,  and  received  him  with  the  utmost 
warmth  of  friendship.  The  bills  were  indorsed  by  Colonel 
Nelson,  received  by  P.  H.,  and  the  troops,  except  the  Hanover 
volunteers,  dismissed." 

Prolix  as  it  is,  we  have  been  at  pains  to  reproduce 
this  account  of  the  meeting  of  Braxton  and  Henry, 
because  of  its  bearing  upon  Henry's  future.  Henry 
did  what  seemed  to  him  the  best  thing  for  the  public 

207 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

good,  but  in  so  doing  he  made  a  personal  sacrifice ;  that 
is  to  say-,  he  incurred  the  enmity  of  a  rich  and  influential 
man.  Before  the  end  of  the  year,  Braxton  had  it  in 
his  power  to  do  Henry  a  downright  injury.  We 
shall  soon  come  to  this;  it  should  be  added  now  that 
whatever  Meredith's  misconceptions  as  to  Henry's 
actual  initiative  of  the  expedition,  there  appears  to  be 
no  sound  reason  why  they  should  vitiate  other  parts 
of  his  narrative.  He  was  certainly  a  man  of  high  char 
acter;  he  was  certainly  with  Henry  from  New  Castle 
on ;  and  his  circumstantial  statement  with  respect  to 
Carter  Braxton  has  upon  it  the  stamp  of  truth. 

Throughout  this  passage-at-arms  Henry  acted  with 
prescience,  vigor,  and  circumspection.  Some  may  say 
that  he  should  have  marched  on  to  Williamsburg  and 
swept  Dunmore  out  of  Virginia.  No  doubt  he  felt  like 
doing  so;  but  he  knew  his  Virginians  too  well  to  go 
beyond  the  point  of  reprisal.  If  he  had  put  himself  in 
the  wrong,  he  might  have  harmed  the  patriot  cause  with 
the  "  peace  party  "  men,  whom  he  was  seeking  to  win 
over.  Weatherwise  as  to  the  great  storm  muttering 
'round  the  sky,  he  saw  that  what  was  done  to-day  should 
be  done  with  to-morrow  constantly  in  view.  Therefore 
he  was  careful  to  put  upon  record  an  exact  statement  of 
his  object  and  his  acts.  In  his  receipt  to  Corbin  he 
made  it  clear  that  such  of  the  money  as  should  not  be 
used  in  buying  fifteen  half-barrels  of  gunpowder  would 
be  returned,  and  this  was  done ;  for  Henry  himself  sub 
sequently  bought  the  powder  for  £112  IDS.,  resupplied 
the  colony,  and  gave  back  the  balance  of  the  money  to 
the  Receiver-General.  Trifling  though  this  matter 
seems,  it  is  of  consequence  in  that  it  throws  a  light  upon 
the  man's  character,  and  once  more  disproves  the  fallacy 
as  to  his  inattention  to  detail. 

By  reason  of  the  gunpowder  transaction,  Henry 
became  more  than  ever  the  "  Man  of  the  People."  The 

208 


AS  A  SOLDIER 

Hanover  County  Committee  insisted  upon  assuming 
responsibility  for  his  act.  Eight  other  counties  formally 
thanked  him.  Louis  Hue  Girardin,  referring  to  the 
period  of  this  exploit,  declares  that  "  Patrick  Henry  was 
now  at  the  zenith  of  his  popularity."  Nevertheless, 
hardly  had  he  returned  to  "  Scotchtown  "  when  he  found 
himself  the  subject  of  a  fulmination  from  the  "  palace  " : 
"  I  have  been  informed,  from  undoubted  authority," 
said  Dunmore,  in  a  proclamation,  under  date  of  the 
8th  of  May,  "  that  a  certain  Patrick  Henry  and  a 
number  of  his  deluded  followers  have  taken  up  arms 
.  .  .  and  put  themselves  in  a  posture  for  war;" 
wherefore  all  persons  were  strictly  charged,  "  upon 
their  allegiance,  not  to  aid,  abet,  or  give  countenance 
to  the  said  Patrick  Henry." 

The  "  said  Patrick  "  paid  no  further  attention  to  the 
official  attaint  than  to  address  an  explanatory  letter  to 
Francis  Lightfoot  Lee.  As  he  was  going  North,  he 
wanted  Lee  to  set  him  right  before  the  coming  Con 
vention.  Nor  would  he  have  cared  if  he  had  known  that 
Dunmore  was  denouncing  him  to  the  Ministry  over-sea. 
Dunmore  wrote  that  Henry  was  "  a  man  of  desperate 
circumstances,  who  had  been  active  in  encouraging  dis 
obedience  and  exciting  a  spirit  of  revolt  among  the 
people  for  many  years  past."  The  members  of  the 
Council,  too,  expressed  their  "  detestation  and  abhor 
rence  for  that  licentious  and  ungovernable  spirit  that  had 
gone  forth  and  misled  the  once  happy  people  of  the 
country."  "  It  was  thus,"  says  Girardin,  "  that  this 
body  permitted  itself  to  speak  of  that  glorious  spirit  of 
liberty  which  at  that  time  glowed  alike  in  every  Vir 
ginian  bosom.  Henceforward  the  Council  was  consid 
ered  as  the  enemy  of  liberty  and  the  abettor  of  tyranny, 
and  became  scarcely  less  odious  in  the  eyes  of  the  people 
than  Dunmore  himself."  But  Girardin  speeds  some 
what  too  fast.  Loyalty,  or  something  very  like  loyalty, 
14  209 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

still  lingered  in  a  few  "  Virginian  bosoms,"  and  the 
breath  was  not  as  yet  quite  out  of  that  ancient  body, 
the  House  of  Burgesses.  Once  more  it  met — this  time 
to  weigh  and  reject  the  belated  conciliatory  proposals 
of  Lord  North.  And  once  more  the  Powder  Horn 
comes  into  the  story.  While  the  Burgesses  were  sitting, 
some  young  men  who  wanted  arms  entered  the  ancient 
arsenal  by  night,  whereupon  one  of  a  number  of  spring- 
guns,  set  by  Dunmore's  direction,  shot  them  foully. 
Again  the  people  rose,  and  Dunmore  fled  to  a  war-ship 
in  the  York.  The  Burgesses  saw  that  they  could  do 
nothing  to  patch  up  peace.  Most  of  them  had  no  wish 
to  do  anything,  unless  a  great  victory  could  be  won 
without  war.  But  they  expected  war.  Some  of  them 
were  in  hunting  shirts  and  kept  their  rifles  at  hand. 
"  It  was  no  longer  a  body  of  civilians  in  ruffles  and 
powder,"  says  John  Esten  Cooke,  "but  a  meeting  of 
men  in  military  accoutrements  ready  to  fight."  They 
adjourned ;  and  after  that  there  was  never  a  quorum. 
Thrice  again  the  dying  colonial  parliament  gasped. 
Finally  the  Journal  records  that  "  several  members  met, 
but  did  neither  proceed  to  business  or  adjourn."  "And 
below  these  words,"  says  W.  G.  Stanard,  "  the  clerk 
has  written  in  heavy  lettering  '  FINIS/  closing  the  record 
of  the  last  of  the  Virginia  Colonial  Legislatures  with 
an  elaborate  corkscrew  tail-piece." 

At  this  point  it  seems  but  fair  to  say  that  in  ten  years 
Henry  and  those  who  sided  with  him  had  practically 
rid  "  the  most  loyal  colony  "  of  loyalists.  The  Tory 
element  was  absorbed  by  strictly  American  parties. 
From  Massachusetts,  in  the  final  tempest,  there  was  an 
exodus  of  more  than  a  thousand  out-and-out  King's 
men ;  but  the  notable  Virginia  refugees  could  be  counted 
on  the  fingers  of  one  hand.  May  we  not  intimate  that, 
in  a  measure,  the  unity  of  the  Old  Dominion  people  is 
a  tribute  to  Henry's  politic  course  and  to  the  effective- 

210 


AS  A  SOLDIER 

ness  of  his  pleas?  In  vain  do  we  search  among  these 
few  refugees  for  some  such  tidewater  character  as 
that  old  lover  of  royalty,  George  James  Bruere,  Gov 
ernor  of  the  Bermudas,  who,  like  Byrd,  might  have 
figured  in  a  Thackeray  novel.  Says  his  grandson, 
Henry  St.  George  Tucker,  nephew  of  the  Virginia  St. 
George : 

"  I  remember  to  have  seen  him,  after  rather  copious  libations, 
go  through  the  evolutions  of  the  battle  of  Culloden,  and  other 
great  fights  in  which  he  was  personally  engaged.  He  marched 
and  countermarched — charged  the  enemy  with  great  vigor — 
handled  his  large  stick  with  great  skill  and  effect  (albeit  with 
some  peril  to  those  around  him),  and  generally  concluded 
with  the  shout  of  victory — the  '  British  Grenadiers ' — or  the 
popular  anthem,  '  God  Save  the  King.'  He  was  heart  and  soul 
a  Royalist;  while  my  grandfather  Tucker,*  from  his  American 
connexions,  took  a  favorable  view  of  the  American  cause.  The 
uncompromising  Governor  called  the  Americans  'rebels' — a 
term  of  reproach  which,  naturally  enough,  gave  mortal  offence 
to  one  who,  at  that  moment,  had  two  sons  to  whom  the 
opprobrious  term  applied.  These  proud  spirits  separated,  never 
again  to  meet  in  friendly  hall." 

But  if  there  were  no  Brueres  in  Virginia,  there  was 
a  Wormley.  Ralph  Wormley  was  the  last  of  the  loyal 
ists.  Educated  at  Eton  and  Oxford,  he  was  perhaps 
the  dearest  lover  of  books  in  all  America.  He  had  two 
things  at  heart — his  library  and  the  great  Anglican 
empire.  As  a  member  of  Dunmore's  Council,  he  had 
just  expressed  his  "  detestation  and  abhorrence "  of 
Henry's  rebellious  spirit.  But  in  more  pacific  times, 
happening  to  enter  a  Williamsburg  store  one  day,  Henry 

*  One  of  the  sons  of  this  Bermuda  Tucker  was  the  grand 
father  of  Charlotte  M.  Tucker,  known  in  literature  as  "  A.  L. 
O.  E." ;  another  son  was  Tudor,  Treasurer  of  the  United  States 
under  Washington  and  other  Presidents  down  to  John  Quincy 
Adams'  time;  still  another  son,  Nathaniel,  a  doctor  in  England, 
started  a  twelve-book  epic  on  the  American  Revolution. 

211 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

saw  this  worthy,  deep  in  an  ancient  tome.  "  What, 
Mr.  Wormley,  still  studying  books !  "  said  he.  "  Study 
men,  Mr.  Wormley,  study  men !  "  One  can  imagine 
with  what  contempt  the  Oxford  scholar  received  this 
remark,  underrating  as  he  did  the  living  books  so 
familiar  to  his  critic.  Wormley  did  not  leave  America 
during  the  war.  Henry  liked  him — all  who  knew  him 
esteemed  him ;  and  he  and  his  cartloads  of  treasures 
were  sent  beyond  the  Blue  Ridge.  But,  sighing  for 
the  tidewater  country,  he  at  last  returned  thither.  A 
Tory  privateer  from  New  York  landed,  and  plundered 
his  house.  Thus,  with  his  venerated  empire  disrupted 
by  the  Whigs  and  his  beloved  books  vandalized  by  the 
Tories,  poor  Ralph  Wormley,  sitting  among  his  empty 
shelves,  had  poignant  reason  for  remembering  Henry's 
words,  "  Study  men." 

Three  days  after  his  return  from  the  gunpowder 
expedition,  Henry  left  home  for  the  North.  It  was 
expected  that  Dunmore  would  seek  to  intercept  him. 
Here  is  a  newspaper  account  of  his  journey: 

"  Hanover,  May  12,  1775. — Yesterday  Patrick  Henry,  one 
of  the  Delegates  of  this  Colony,  escorted  by  a  number  of 
respectable  young  gentlemen,  Volunteers  from  this  and  King 
William  and  Caroline  Counties,  set  out  to  attend  the  General 
Congress.  They  proceeded  with  him  as  far  as  Mrs.  Hooe's 
Ferry  on  the  Potomack,  by  whom  they  were  most  kindly  and 
hospitably  entertained;  and  also  provided  with  boats  and  hands 
to  cross  the  river.  And  after  partaking  of  this  lady's  benefi 
cence,  the  bulk  of  the  company  took  their  leave  of  Mr. 
Henry,  saluting  him  with  two  platoons  and  repeated  huzzas.  A 
guard  accompanied  that  worthy  gentleman  to  the  Maryland 
side,  who  saw  him  safely  landed,  and  committing  him  to 
the  gracious  and  wise  Disposer  of  all  human  events,  to  guide 
and  protect  while  contending  for  a  restitution  of  our  dearest 
rights  and  liberties,  they  wished  him  a  safe  journey  and  a 
happy  return  to  his  family  and  friends." 

As  he  rode  towards  Philadelphia,  was  it  in  Henry's 
mind  to  become  a  soldier?  Had  his  success  with  the 

212 


AS  A  SOLDIER 

volunteers  influenced  him  in  the  matter?  Had  he  not 
long  led  in  voicing  resistance,  and  would  it  not  be  his 
duty  to  fight,  now  that  the  time  for  fighting  had  come? 
Naked  consistency  demanded  that  he  should  make  a 
soldier  of  himself.  And  when  he  reached  Philadelphia, 
he  saw  much  to  feed  and  fire  his  military  spirit.  It 
was  a  livelier  city  than  the  one  he  had  left  the  fall 
before.  Camped  in  the  groves  were  light  infantrymen 
in  green,  as  well  as  many  militia-men  in  brown,  with 
buck-tails  on  their  little  round  hats  and  the  word 
"  Liberty "  on  their  cartouch-boxes.  Even  his  con 
sumptive-looking  friend  Dickinson  intended  to  go  out 
as  a  colonel.  Moreover,  when  Henry  took  his  seat  as 
one  of  the  seventy-eight  members  of  the  Second  Con 
gress,  which  he  did  on  Thursday,  the  i8th  of  May, 
eight  days  late,  he  almost  touched  elbows  with  Wash 
ington,  wearing  his  blue  and  buff.  "  There  he  was 
.  symbolically  clad  in  his  military  uniform,  a 
sword  at  his  side,  the  thoughtful  Colonel,  who  spoke  in 
deeds,  not  words."  Nor  had  Henry  more  than  time 
to  survey  the  State  House  hall,  soon  to  be  known  as 
Independence  Hall,  and  perhaps  note  the  presence  of 
that  great  man,  Benjamin  Franklin,  and  Boston's  rich 
importer,  John  Hancock,  when  the  President  announced 
from  his  chair  the  glorious  news  of  the  taking  of  Ticon- 
deroga.  It  was,  indeed,  a  stirring  time  throughout  the 
country — Bunker  Hill  summer  was  about  to  open,  and 
Henry,  with  his  fellow  members,  partook  of  the  gen 
eral  excitement.  In  Committee  of  the  Whole  on  the 
state  of  America,  they  spent  a  week  debating  as  to  the 
course  to  be  pursued ;  and  on  the  26th  of  May  they 
voted  to  prepare  for  defence.  Jay  and  Dickinson  were 
for  further  parley;  the  Adamses,  and  beyond  doubt 
Henry,  though  no  record  of  speeches  by  him  is  to  be 
had,  stood  up  for  the  immediate  creation  of  an  army 
and  navy.  '  The  bugle  call  to  arms  which  he  had 

213 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

sounded  in  the  Virginia  Convention  only  two  months 
before,"  says  William  Wirt  Henry,  "  was  most  cer 
tainly  repeated  with  all  the  energy  and  eloquence  of 
which  he  was  capable,  now  that  he  stood  in  the  midst 
of  the  representatives  of  the  United  Colonies." 

There  is  evidence  that  in  this  Congress  Washington 
and  Henry  thought  alike  and  worked  together.  They 
were  on  a  committee  to  fortify  the  colony  of  New  York, 
and  on  another  to  supply  the  continent  with  military 
necessities;  and  they  otherwise  labored  in  concert  to 
prepare  for  war.  On  the  I5th  of  June,  when  Washing 
ton  was  made  Commander-in-Chief,  tears  came  into  his 
eyes  as  he  said  to  Henry :  '  This  day  will  be  the  com 
mencement  of  the  decline  of  my  reputation."  Accord 
ing  to  the  Journal  for  the  2ist  of  June,  "  Mr.  Henry 
informed  the  Congress  that  the  General  had  put  into 
his  hands  sundry  queries  to  which  he  desired  the  Con 
gress  would  give  an  answer.''  With  Franklin  and 
Judge  James  Wilson,  Henry  was  selected  to  manage  the 
Indian  affairs  of  the  Middle  Department.  When  the 
news  came  that  Joseph  Warren  had  been  slain,  he  was 
quick  to  draw  a  patriotic  moral.  "  A  breach  on  our 
affections,"  said  he,  "  was  needed  to  arouse  the  country 
to  action."  In  his  talks  with  John  Adams,  "  Patrick 
Henry  was  in  favor  of  [foreign]  alliances,  even  if  they 
must  be  bought  by  concessions  of  territory." 

In  fine,  we  conclude  that  during  this  whole  session 
of  Congress  Henry  was  a  "  business  member  " — alert, 
useful,  ready  to  speak  the  right  word  or  to  do  the 
right  thing.  We  are  just  reaching  this  conclusion  with 
respect  to  poor  Henry  when  we  turn  a  corner  and  come 
face  to  face  with  Mr.  Jefferson,  who  says : 

"  I  found  Henry  to  be  a  silent  and  almost  unmeddling  mem 
ber  in  Congress.  On  the  original  opening  of  that  body,  while 
general  grievances  were  the  topic,  he  was  in  his  element,  and 
captivated  all  by  his  bold  and  splendid  eloquence.  But  as  soon 

214 


AS  A  SOLDIER 

as  they  came  to  specific  matters,  to  sober  reasoning  and 
solid  argumentation,  he  had  the  good  sense  to  perceive  that 
his  declamation,  however  excellent  in  its  proper  place,  had  no 
weight  at  all  in  such  an  assembly  as  that,  of  cool-headed, 
reflecting,  judicious  men.  He  ceased,  therefore,  in  a  great 
measure,  to  take  part  in  the  business.  He  seemed,  indeed, 
very  tired  of  the  place,  and  wonderfully  relieved  when,  by 
appointment  of  the  Virginia  Convention  to  be  Colonel  of 
their  first  regiment,  he  was  permitted  to  leave  Congress  about 
the  last  of  July." 

Remembering  that  Mr.  Jefferson  himself  had  re 
mained  so  long  with  the  dying  House  of  Burgesses  that 
he  did  not  take  his  seat  in  Congress  until  the  2 1st  of 
June;  that  Henry  did  not  start  for  home  until  after 
the  adjournment  of  Congress  on  the  ist  of  August; 
that  his  election  to  the  colonelcy  of  the  First  Virginia 
Regiment  did  not  take  place  until  the  5th  of  August — 
remembering  these  things,  and  others  unnecessary  to 
recapitulate,  we  lift  our  hat  to  Mr.  Jefferson  and  pass 
on. 

In  the  latter  days  of  the  session,  Henry's  silence,  if 
silent  he  were,  may  have  been  due  to  the  fact  that  he 
had  already  said  his  say ;  or  it  may  have  been  due  to  a 
natural  concern  on  his  part  as  to  political  developments 
in  Virginia ;  or  it  is  possible  that  in  the  dead  of  summer 
his  committee  work  was  exacting  and  fatiguing.  It 
must  be  apparent  to  every  one  who  closely  follows  his 
life  that  he  was  a  steady  and  sturdy  thinker — none 
more  clear-headed ;  and  there  was  that  in  the  situation 
of  the  country,  as  well  as  in  his  own  changing  rela 
tions  to  the  public,  which  gave  him  much  to  ponder  over. 
For  instance,  we  come  again  to  the  question  he  was 
asking  himself:  Should  he  be  a  soldier?  Many  mem 
bers  expected  to  belt  on  the  sword,  and  some  of  them 
looked  for  high  places  in  the  army.  "  Oh  that  I  were 
a  soldier!  I  will  be,"  wrote  the  ambitious  husband  of 
Abigail  Adams;  and  this  same  worthy,  telling  of  the 

215 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

time  when  he  named  Washington  as  Continental  Com- 
mander-in-Chief,  says: 

"  Mr.  Hancock — who  was  our  President,  which  gave  me  an 
opportunity  to  observe  his  countenance  while  I  was  speaking 
on  the  state  of  the  Colonies,  the  army  at  Cambridge,  and  the 
enemy — heard  me  with  visible  pleasure ;  but  when  I  came  to 
describe  Washington  for  the  commander,  I  never  remarked 
a  more  sudden  and  striking  change  of  countenance.  Mortifi 
cation  and  resentment  were  expressed  as  forcibly  as  his  face 
could  exhibit  them." 

Hancock  expected  that  Hancock  would  be  the  man. 
And  when  Congress  in  a  body  attended  General  Wash 
ington's  review  of  the  Pennsylvania  troops — light  horse, 
artillery,  rangers,  riflemen — how  emulous  the  members 
must  have  been  of  the  gentry  with  shoulder-straps,  who, 
in  their  pride  and  pomp  of  war,  seemed  to  be  about 
to  carry  off  the  laurels  of  the  long-brewing  conflict ! 
All  morning  on  the  day  of  the  review  the  streets  of 
the  city  were  given  over  to  soldiers  and  crowds  of 
spectators.  It  was  an  infectious  scene,  a  spectacle  to 
glory  in — drums  rolling,  fifes  whistling  their  merriest, 
cannon  sounding  from  river  to  river.  The  smell  of 
burnt  gunpowder  put  fight  into  many  a  man  hitherto 
content  to  wear  a  broadbrim;  and  good  Quakers  that 
very  hour  broke  away  from  the  tenets  of  their  faith. 
Thus  we  see  that  if  Henry's  "  striking  and  lucky  coup 
de  main/'  as  Rives  calls  the  gunpowder  expedition,  had 
put  it  into  his  head  to  try  his  skill  in  the  field,  the  idea 
must  have  ripened  in  the  patriotic  and  military  atmos 
phere  of  Philadelphia. 

Since  they  reached  Richmond  together,  taking  their 
seats  in  the  Third  Virginia  Convention  on  the  9th  of 
August,  it  may  be  assumed  that  Henry  and  Harrison 
and  Jefferson  and  Pendleton  rode  down  in  company 
all  the  way  from  Philadelphia.  If  so,  how  did  they 
pair?  The  jovial  Harrison  was  heavy  only  to  his  horse.. 

216 


AS  A  SOLDIER 

Henry  was  of  repute  as  a  most  agreeable  comrade  of 
the  saddle.  Pendleton  was  in  every  way  equal  to  the 
pretty  business  of  masking  his  thoughts  about  a  rival 
and  of  entertaining  his  fellow-travellers.  If  Henry 
broached  the  subject  of  soldiering,  Pendleton  would 
have  talked  well  on  the  subject;  but  his  mind  would 
have  outsped  his  tongue,  upon  which  he  kept  a  rein  as 
upon  his  horse.  His  was  a  lawyer's  view  of  the  world. 
"  The  report  of  a  law  case  had  for  him  a  charm  which 
a  novel  has  for  others."  Jefferson,  the  young  man  of 
the  party,  kept  closer  to  Pendleton  than  to  Henry. 
'  Taken  all  in  all,"  Jefferson  thought  Pendleton  "  the 
ablest  man  in  debate  "  he  had  "  ever  met  with."  "  He 
had  not,  indeed,  the  poetical  fancy  of  Mr.  Henry,  his 
sublime  imagination,  his  lofty  and  overwhelming  dic 
tion,"  but.  Jefferson  had  lasting  respect  for  his  high 
qualities  as  a  reasoner.  So  we  see  them  pass  southward, 
two  by  two,  without  aloofness  on  Pendleton's  part 
towards  Henry,  and  Henry  unconscious  of  any  eerie 
discomfort  when  he  rode  in  Pendleton's  shadow.  It 
would  be  different  when  cooler  weather  came;  but  just 
now  it  was  ripening  weather,  and  if  the  party  put  up 
at  "  Scotchtown,"  we  may  be  sure  they  saw  the  red 
heart  of  some  monster  melon  sweet  to  the  tooth. 

There  was  news  for  them  in  Richmond.  The  Con 
vention  had  met  on  the  ifth  of  July.  Fresh  to  public 
service,  and  sitting  in  Washington's  seat,  was  George 
Mason — a  great  man — with  whom  Henry  now  formed 
a  friendship  unbroken  till  death.  Mason  saw  about  him 
a  body  of  delegates  less  to  his  liking  than  he  had  hoped 
to  see.  Yet  the  Convention  got  along.  "  We  must 
fight  "  was  written  across  its  chief  ordinances,  and  it 
specifically  provided  for  an  enrolment  of  the  fighters. 
In  addition  to  8180  minute-men,  it  voted  to  organize 
three  regular  regiments,  each  a  thousand  strong,  with 
five  companies  of  buckskin  boys  for  the  mountain  border. 

217 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

Who  should  lead  them?  A  debate  arose,  and  Henry's 
shortcomings  were  dwelt  upon.  It  was  said  that  "  his 
studies  had  been  directed  to  civil  and  not  military  pur 
suits;  that  he  was  totally  unacquainted  with  the  art  of 
war,  and  had  no  knowledge  of  military  discipline." 
There  were  good  soldiers  in  Virginia,  and  one  of  them 
at  least  was  present — Andrew  Lewis,  who  with  his  five 
brothers  had  fought  in  Braddock's  war.  He  it  was  who 
at  Point  Pleasant  had  coolly  smoked  his  pipe  while 
riflemen  fell  around  him — not  flinching  even  when  his 
dear  brother,  Colonel  Charles,  was  killed,  but  resolutely 
keeping  up  his  battle  till  Cornstalk  perished  and  the 
Shawanese  broke  away  through  the  forest.  Fiery,  bold, 
a  six-footer  like  Washington — "  the  earth  seemed  to 
tremble  under  him  as  he  walked  along."  But  General 
Lewis  was  bespoken.  Washington  wished  him  to  be  a 
major-general  in  the  Continental  line. 

Another  good  Virginia  soldier — born  in  Aberdeen 
about  the  time  that  Patrick  Henry's  father  left  it — was 
the  Scotch  doctor  of  Fredericksburg,  Hugh  Mercer, 
who  in  time  fell  at  Princeton.  On  the  first  ballot  Mercer 
led ;  but  the  logic  of  the  situation,  a  name  to  conjure 
with  in  raising  recruits,  and  the  fresh  eclat  of  the 
Powder  Horn  episode — these  and  other  recommenda 
tions  gained  for  Patrick  Henry  the  place  he  wished. 
When  he  reached  Richmond,  he  found  himself  Colonel 
of  the  First  Regiment  and  Commander-in-Chief  of  the 
provincial  army  about  to  be  raised.  The  proposed 
third  regiment  was  not  formed.  William  Woodford,  a 
trained  officer,  became  Colonel  of  the  Second  Regiment. 
He  was  a  strong  character.  He  had  lobbied  for  Mercer 
against  Henry,  whom  he  regarded  as  a  mere  civilian. 
Already  there  were  signs  that  certain  followers  of  the 
drum  harbored  prejudices  against  those  who  were  yet 
to  win  their  scars. 

On  the  26th  of  August,  the  last  day  of  the  session, 
218 


AS  A  SOLDIER 

Henry  became  officially  a  soldier.  His  commission  was 
signed  by  the  Committee  of  Safety — a  newly-created 
body  which  he  himself  had  helped  to  bring  into  being. 
As  we  shall  see,  it  was  to  be  a  case  in  which  the  eagle 
grew  the  feather  that  fledged  the  arrow  that  brought 
the  eagle  down. 

Let  us  take  careful  note  of  the  plight  of  the  Com 
monwealth  and  of  the  functions  of  this  Committee.  It 
was  the  transition  period  between  the  end  of  royal  and 
the  beginning  of  republican  institutions.  All  was  loose ; 
all  was  tentative ;  much  depended  upon  the  men  invested 
with  authority,  and  upon  the  way  they  construed  that 
authority.  There  was  no  Governor.  The  Convention 
could  not  sit  continuously ;  therefore  it  appointed  "  a 
Committee  of  Safety  for  the  more  effectual  carrying 
into  execution  [of]  the  several  rules  and  regulations 
established  by  this  Convention  for  the  protection  of 
this  Colony."  Its  chairman  was  Edmund  Pendleton, 
and  the  other  members  were  George  Mason,  John  Page, 
Richard  Bland,  Thomas  Ludwell  Lee,  Paul  Carrington, 
Dudley  Digges,  William  Cabell,  Carter  Braxton,  James 
Mercer,  and  John  Tabb.  By  his  commission  and  by  his 
oath,  Henry  was  to  obey  "  all  orders  and  instructions  " 
which  he  might  receive  from  the  Committee.  At  the 
same  time,  it  was  specified  that  he  was  to  be  "  Colonel 
of  the  First  Regiment  of  Regulars  and  Commander- 
in-Chief  of  all  the  forces  to  be  raised  for  the  protection 
of  this  colony/'  "  All  officers  and  soldiers,  and  every 
person  whatsoever,  in  any  way  concerned,"  were  to  be 
"  obedient  and  assisting  to  him." 

With  these  facts  in  mind,  let  us  follow  Pendleton, 
the  civil  head,  and  Henry,  the  military  head,  to  Wil- 
liamsburg,  the  rendezvous  of  the  troops.  Pendleton 
took  with  him  a  quorum  of  the  Committee.  In  Mason's 
absence,  due  to  illness,  there  is  no  doubt  that  Pendleton 
had  his  own  way  in  most  matters.  Let  it  be  remem- 

219 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

bered,  also,  that  Carter  Braxton,  whom  Henry  had 
rebuffed  at  Doncastle's  Ordinary,  was  now  in  a  position 
to  help  or  hurt  him. 

But  as  yet  there  were  no  signs  of  friction  between 
the  Committee  and  the  commander,  who  spent  a  month 
at  "  Scotchtown,"  setting  his  house  in  order,  so  that 
when  once  afield  he  might  go  as  far  and  stay  as  long  as 
need  be.  "  Thursday  last,"  says  the  Williamsburg 
Gazette,  September  23,  "  arrived  here  Patrick  Henry, 
Esq.,  Commander-in-Chief  of  the  Virginia  forces.  He 
was  met  and  escorted  to  town  by  the  whole  body  of 
volunteers,  who  paid  him  every  mark  of  respect  and 
distinction  in  their  power."  He  pitched  his  camp  in 
the  fields  west  of  the  College;  and  week  by  week  the 
encampment  grew,  until,  in  mid-October,  it  contained 
nine  companies  of  regulars.  Arms  were  scarce.  In 
their  drill,  hundreds  of  men  handled  old  fowling-pieces. 
The  soldiers  of  the  First  Regiment  were  uniformed  in 
buckskin  hunting  shirts  and  leggings,  but,  as  a  rule, 
motley  was  the  wear.  The  Culpeper  minute-men  were 
clad  in  green.  On  the  breasts  of  their  hunting  shirts 
big  white  letters  spelled  out  the  legend,  "  Liberty  or 
Death " ;  buck-tails  drooped  picturesquely  from  their 
hats,  and  their  belts  held  tomahawks  and  scalping- 
knives.  In  Henry's  camp  was  young  John  Marshall,  a 
Fauquier  lieutenant,  and  he  too  wore  the  motto  of  the 
time.  Not  till  later  did  the  Third  Virginia  delight  the 
patriot  maids  of  the  colony  by  appearing  in  sky-blue, 
faced  in  paler  blue ;  and  there  is  no  evidence  whatever 
that  Patrick  Henry  ever  donned  the  blue  and  buff. 

October  was  spent  in  disciplining  the  troops.  There 
was  doubt  as  to  the  advisability  of  aggressive  effort. 
As  the  days  passed,  Henry  realized  that  his  first  rub 
would  be,  not  with  Dunmore  on  the  bayside,  but  with 
the  gentlemen  of  the  Committee.  Digges,  Page,  and 
Carrington  are  said  to  have  cooperated  with  Colonel 

220 


AS  A  SOLDIER 

Henry;  but  not  so  Pendleton  and  his  followers.  The 
whole  force  of  regulars  was  soon  to  be  put  into  the 
Continental  line ;  and  it  suited  Pendleton  to  keep  Henry 
inactive,  so  that  some  one  sent  down  by  Congress  might 
supersede  him.  Meantime,  it  troubled  Henry,  thus 
ignobly  held  in  the  leash,  that  Dunmore  should  be  per 
mitted  to  burn  and  rob  along  the  rivers,  and  go  unpun 
ished.  Dunmore  had  two  redcoat  regiments,  a  band  of 
Tories,  some  refugee  negroes,  and  a  fleet  of  war-vessels. 
His  depredations  were  the  talk  of  the  camp.  The  Nor 
folk  region  was  his  haunt,  and  thither  Henry  wished 
to  march,  but  the  Committee  held  him  back,  sending 
Woodford  instead.  This  was  late  in  November.  On 
the  way  to  Norfolk,  Woodford  ignored  Henry  until 
reminded  of  his  remissness ;  then  he  wrote :  "  When 
joined,  I  shall  always  esteem  myself  immediately  under 
your  command,  and  will  obey  accordingly;  but  when 
sent  to  command  a  separate  and  distinct  body  of  troops, 
under  the  immediate  instructions  of  the  Committee  of 
Safety — whenever  that  body  or  the  honorable  Com 
mittee  is  sitting,  I  look  upon  it  as  my  indispensable 
duty  to  address  my  intelligence  to  them,  as  the  supreme 
power  in  this  colony."  Hardly  had  Henry  received 
this  by  no  means  "  obedient  and  assisting  "  letter,  when 
news  came  of  Woodford's  victory  at  Great  Bridge — 
"  a  circumstance/'  says  Wirt,  "  not  very  well  calcu 
lated  to  gild  the  pill  of  contumacy  "  presented  to  the 
Commander-in-Chief.  One  can  imagine  Henry's  dis 
tress  at  this  time.  As  a  good  American,  and  as  a  gen 
erous  man,  he  was  bound  to  rejoice  in  Woodford's 
victory;  but,  personally,  it  was  in  the  nature  of  things 
that  he  should  feel  deep  chagrin,  tinctured  with  vexa 
tion  and  resentment.  He  could  understand  why  Brax- 
ton  *  might  choose  to  harass  him ;  but  what  of  Pendle- 

*  In  justice  to  Carter  Braxton,  let  it  be  said  that  there  is  no 
direct  evidence  implicating  him  in  an  intrigue  against  Patrick 

221 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

ton's  distrust,  or  assumption  of  distrust?  He  was  in  a 
dilemma  indeed.  He  knew  that  much  was  expected  of 
him  by  the  people ;  his  reputation  was  at  stake ;  yet  here 
he  was,  under  a  cross-fire,  and  could  do  nothing  at  all, 
while  a  defiant  subordinate  was  winning  glory.  Every 
one  was  talking  of  the  victory  over  Dunmore.  Even 
if  people  laughed  about  black  Billy  Flora,  whose  worst 
oath  was  "  I'll  be  buttered !  "  and  called  him  a  hero 
for  what  he  had  done  in  a  shower  of  bullets  at  Great 
Bridge,  Henry  knew  that  the  real  hero  was  Woodford, 
and  he  knew,  too,  that  he  must  have  it  out  with  this 
same  Woodford.  Self-respect  demanded  such  a  course. 
But  when  he  asked  the  Committee  of  Safety  for  a  ruling 
in  the  matter,  he  saw  that  Pendleton  was  less  concerned 
about  giving  umbrage  to  him  than  about  offending  the 
victorious  Colonel.  It  was  decided  that  while  Colonel 
Woodford  "  ought  to  correspond  with  Colonel  Henry," 
the  operations  should  be  directed  by  the  Committee. 

That  the  Convention  itself,  then  assembled  at  Wil- 
liamsburg,  disapproved  of  Pendleton's  course  is  shown 
in  the  vote  reconstituting  the  Committee  of  Safety.  In 
the  ballot,  Pendleton  fell  from  first  place  to  fourth, 
but  he  was  still  strong  enough  to  maintain  his  hold  of 
affairs.  Perhaps  his  ill-will  towards  Henry  was  in 
creased  by  the  Convention's  rebuke,  for  he  wrote  to 
Woodford,  on  Christmas  Eve: 

Henry.  Nor  has  any  Virginia  historian  intimated  as  much. 
The  deduction  is  purely  speculative,  and  is  the  writer's  own. 
It  is  based  upon  Meredith's  account  of  the  Doncastle  incident 
and  upon  the  assumption  that  Braxton  had  his  share  of  human 
nature.  He  would  have  been  a  generous  man,  indeed,  if  he 
had  pocketed  his  grudge  and  played  absolutely  fair.  Braxton 
was  an  "aristocrat."  He  had  been  a  member  of  the  House  of 
Burgesses  from  1761  to  1771,  and  must  have  been  known  to 
Henry.  How  obnoxious  Henry  found  Braxton's  "  Address  to 
the  Convention  of  Virginia  on  the  Subject  of  Government  "  will 
appear  on  a  later  page.  Braxton  died  in  1797. 

222 


AS  A  SOLDIER 

"  The  field  officers  to  each  regiment  will  be  named  here, 
and  recommended  to  Congress ;  in  case  our  army  is  taken  into 
Continental  pay,  they  will  send  commissions.  A  general  officer 
will  be  chosen  there,  I  doubt  not,  and  sent  us ;  with  that 
matter  I  hope  we  shall  not  intermeddle,  lest  it  should  be 
thought  propriety  requires  our  calling  or  rather  recommend 
ing  our  present  first  officer  to  the  station.  Believe  me,  sir, 
the  unlucky  step  of  calling  that  gentleman  from  our  councils, 
where  he  was  useful,  into  the  field,  in  an  important  station, 
the  duties  of  which  he  must,  in  the  nature  of  things,  be  an 
entire  stranger  to,  has  given  me  many  an  anxious  and  uneasy 
moment.  In  consequence  of  this  mistaken  step,  which  can't 
now  be  retracted  or  remedied — for  he  has  done  nothing 
worthy  of  degradation  and  must  keep  his  rank,  we  must  be 
deprived  of  the  service  of  some  able  officers,  whose  honor 
and  former  ranks  will  not  suffer  them  to  act  under  him  in 
this  juncture,  when  we  so  much  need  their  services." 

Some  one  evidently  addressed  Washington  in  a  like 
strain,  for  on  March  7  he  wrote  to  Colonel  Joseph  Reed : 

"  I  think  my  countrymen  made  a  capital  mistake  when  they 
took  Henry  out  of  the  senate  to  place  him  in  the  field;  and 
pity  it  is  that  he  does  not  see  this,  and  remove  every  difficulty 
by  a  voluntary  resignation." 

On  the  surface  of  this,  it  would  seem  that  Washing 
ton  and  Pendleton  were  of  one  mind  in  regard  to  Henry. 
Both  thought  him  useful  in  the  forum,  useless  in  the 
field.  Perhaps  Washington  was  influenced  by  a  feeling, 
common  with  commanders,  that  all  was  not  as  it  should 
be  in  the  civilian  branch  of  delegated  public  power,  and 
heartily  desired  the  return  of  a  man  possessing  Henry's 
good  sense  to  the  Continental  Congress.  But,  aside 
from  such  a  speculative  interpretation  of  his  meaning, 
was  Washington  well  informed  as  to  the  state  of  affairs 
at  Williamsburg?  Had  he  heard  the  Henry  side  as 
well  as  the  Pendleton  side?  Would  his  reference  to  the 
matter  have  been  so  light,  so  unqualified,  had  he  known 
the  details  of  what  looks  like  a  genuine  intrigue?  Let 

223 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

it  be  said,  in  passing,  that  Pendleton  had  protested  when 
Washington  was  put  at  the  head  of  the  armies.  Why  ? 
Ostensibly,  on  the  plea  that  a  New  Englander  should 
be  Commander-in-Chief,  since  the  war  threatened  to 
be  waged  in  New  England  territory;  possibly,  because 
he  did  not  wish  to  see  a  Virginian  elevated  so  high  above 
another  able  and  ambitious  Virginian.  As  we  have 
noted,  Washington's  knowledge  of  human  perversity 
was  keen  enough  to  awaken  in  him  the  imps  of  doubt, 
but  up  to  this  time  he  himself  had  been  subjected  to 
no  humiliation.  If  after  his  bitter  experience  with  the 
Conway  Cabal  he  had  been  told  of  an  affair  such  as  the 
Pendleton-Henry  dead-lock,  would  he  not  have  sym 
pathized  with  the  victim?  Plainly,  he  would.  Plainly, 
he  knew  more  of  the  Machiavellian  element  in  human 
nature  after  his  encounter  with  Gates  and  Conway  than 
he  had  known  before.  He  too  had  been  accused  of 
military  incompetence. 

In  borrowing  the  word  "  Machiavellian,"  perhaps  we 
have  gone  too  far.  It  does  not  sound  well  in  America. 
There  is  a  home-made  phrase  that  more  nearly  fits  the 
Pendleton-Henry  case — "  the  freeze-out  policy."  It 
was  certainly  in  use  a  hundred  years  ago,  and  perhaps 
in  1775.  So  sly  were  Henry's  opponents  that  they 
induced  Congress  to  exclude  the  two  existing  Virginia 
regiments  when  it  voted  to  take  over  six  Virginia  bat 
talions.  This  would  have  left  Henry  high  and  dry  as 
an  unhonored  provincial  officer.  But  the  vote  was 
reconsidered,  and  the  two  regiments  were  included. 
Then  Congress  commissioned  Henry  Colonel  of  the  First 
Battalion,  subject  to  the  command  of  some  unnamed 
brigadier,  possibly  Woodford.  This  was  what  Henry 
had  awaited.  He  preferred  to  accept  an  affront  from 
Congress  rather  than  from  Pendleton.  He  was  ready 
now  to  retire,  and  on  the  28th  of  February  he  so  in 
formed  Mr.  Pendleton's  Committee — "  frozen  out." 

224 


AS  A  SOLDIER 

"  Yesterday  morning,"  says  the  Williamsburg  Gazette 
of  March  i,  "  the  troops  in  this  city  being  informed  that 
Patrick  Henry,  Esq.,  Commander-in-Chief  of  the  Vir 
ginia  Forces,  resigned  his  commission  the  day  preced 
ing,  and  was  about  to  leave  them,  the  whole  went  into 
mourning,  and,  under  arms,  waited  on  him  at  his  lodg 
ings."  There  they  addressed  him  in  terms  of  admira 
tion,  affection,  sorrow.  They  told  him  that  they  could 
not  but  applaud  his  spirited  resentment  of  a  "  most 
glaring  indignity."  His  reply  showed  an  unruffled 
temper.  "  I  am  unhappy  to  part  with  you,"  he  said. 
"  I  leave  the  service,  but  I  leave  my  heart  with  you. 
May  God  bless  you,  and  give  you  success  and  safety, 
and  make  you  the  glorious  instruments  of  saving  our 
country."  The  Gazette  continues: 

"  After  the  Officers  had  received  Colonel  Henry's  kind  answer 
to  their  Address,  they  insisted  upon  his  dining  with  them  at 
the  Raleigh  Tavern  before  his  departure,  and  after  dinner  a 
number  of  them  proposed  escorting  him  out  of  town,  but  were 
prevented  by  some  uneasiness  getting  among  the  soldiery, 
who  assembled  in  a  tumultuous  manner  and  demanded  their  dis 
charge,  and  declaring  their  unwillingness  to  serve  under  any 
other  commander.  Upon  which  Colonel  Henry  found  it  neces 
sary  to  stay  a  night  longer  in  town,  which  he  spent  in  visiting 
the  several  barracks,  and  used  every  argument  in  his  power 
with  the  soldiery  to  lay  aside  their  imprudent  resolution,  and  to 
continue  in  the  service  which  he  had  quitted  from  motives  in 
which  his  honor,  alone,  was  concerned,  and  that,  although  he 
was  prevented  from  serving  his  country  in  a  military  capacity, 
yet  his  utmost  abilities  should  ever  be  exerted  for  the  real 
interest  of  the  United  Colonies,  in  support  of  the  glorious 
cause  in  which  they  had  engaged.  This,  accompanied  with 
the  extraordinary  exertions  of  Colonel  Christian  and  the 
other  officers  present,  happily  produced  the  desired  effect, 
the  soldiers  reluctantly  acquiescing." 

Imagine  this  scene — these  incidents.    No  doubt  Henry 
kept  the  night  in  mind  a  long,  long  while.     Even  after 
his  return  to  "  Scotchtown,"  the  soldiers  continued  to 
15  225 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

express  their  love  for  him  and  their  antipathy  to  those 
who  had  forced  him  down.  Ninety  officers  signed  and 
sent  him  a  round-robin,  in  which  they  declared  that 
it  was  he  who  had  first  aroused  the  country,  and  that  it 
was  he  who  had  drawn  them  to  the  standard.  In  camp 
his  "  firmness,  candor,  and  politeness  "  had  obtained  for 
him  "  the  signal  approbation  of  the  wise  " ;  and  it  hurt 
them  to  part  with  him.  Woodford's  officers  put  their 
names  to  this  testimonial,  which  must  have  gone  far  to 
ease  the  soreness  of  Henry's  heart.  In  the  Gazette, 
correspondents  did  not  hesitate  to  attribute  the  outcome 
to  envy.  "  We  apprehend,"  wrote  one,  "  that  envy 
strove  to  bury  in  obscurity  his  [Henry's]  martial  talents. 
Fettered  and  confined,  with  only  an  empty  title,  the 
mere  echo  of  authority,  his  superior  abilities  lay  inac 
tive,  nor  could  be  exerted  for  his  honor  or  his  country's 
good." 

About  this  time  Woodford  thought  of  resigning,  and 
wrote  to  Pendleton  on  the  propriety  of  so  doing.  Pen- 
dleton  replied :  "  I  am  apprehensive  that  your  resigna 
tion  will  be  handled  to  your  disadvantage  from  a  certain 
quarter,  where  all  reputations  are  sacrificed  for  the 
sake  of  one ;  what  does  it  signify  that  he  resigned  with 
out  any  such  cause,  or  assigning  any  reason  at  all?  It 
is  not  without  example  that  others  should  be  censured 
for  what  he  is  applauded  for."  There  was  bitterness 
in  this ;  and  it  brings  us  readily  to  a  view  of  Pendleton's 
side  of  the  case.  It  should  be  remembered  that  an 
enemy  is  not  always  a  conscious  enemy.  There  were 
thousands  in  Virginia  who  swore  by  their  beloved 
Patrick,  but  there  were  hundreds,  at  least,  who  were 
still  under  the  influence  of  the  feeling  that  as  he  had 
come  up  of  a  sudden,  so  he  would  go  down  of  a  sudden. 
It  suited  some  of  them  to  take  this  view ;  they  thought 
themselves  superior  to  Henry,  and  wished  him  of  less 
consequence  that  they  might  be  of  more.  Others  were 

226 


AS  A  SOLDIER 

downright  sincere  in  their  belief  that  as  a  military 
man  Henry  was  out  of  his  element.  Girardin,  who 
wrote  under  Jefferson's  eye,  put  it  in  this  way :  "  The 
elevation  of  Patrick  Henry  to  the  chief  command  of  the 
regular  colonial  forces  was,  in  the  opinion  of  many, 
one  of  those  hasty  measures  into  which  the  efferves 
cence  of  gratitude  not  unfrequently  betrays  even  public 
bodies.  From  national  councils,  where  his  usefulness 
was  pre-eminently  conspicuous,  that  gentleman  was 
called  to  an  important  military  station,  with  the  duties 
of  which  he  must  in  the  nature  of  things  have  been 
wholly  unacquainted ;  whilst,  by  an  unhappy  reaction, 
the  country  lost  the  services  of  some  able  officers  whom 
the  pride  of  former  rank  would  not  suffer  to  act  under 
him — a  loss  peculiarly  to  be  lamented  in  the  infancy  of 
an  arduous  struggle,  at  a  time  when  Virginia  counted 
only  a  few  military  characters  possessed  of  qualifications 
necessary  for  doing  their  duty  with  honor  to  themselves 
and  security  to  the  common  cause." 

But  it  is  Hugh  Blair  Grigsby  who  makes  the  best 
defence  of  Pendleton.  Grigsby  would  have  been  dis 
tressed,  indeed,  if  he  had  convinced  himself  that  Pen 
dleton  was  other  than  a  noble-minded  man.  Every 
Fourth  of  July  for  forty  years  Grigsby  and  Robert  C. 
Winthrop  wrote  patriotic  letters  to  each  other.  With 
all  their  souls  these  patriots  loved  the  men  of  the  Revo 
lution;  and  this  love  led  them  to  idealize  the  Fathers, 
among  whom,  in  Grigsby's  opinion,  Pendleton  stood 
well  to  the  front.  In  his  delightful  volume,  "The 
Virginia  Convention  of  1776,"  Grigsby  says: 

"  Nothing  could  show  more  clearly  the  general  confidence 
reposed  in  him  than  his  unanimous  election  by  the  Convention 
of  July,  1775,  as  the  head  of  the  Committee  of  Safety.  That 
body  consisted  of  eleven  members,  was  in  the  interval  of  the 
sessions  of  the  Conventions  the  executive  of  the  Colony, 
and  was  always  in  session.  Its  duties  were  of  the  most 
delicate,  of  the  most  perplexing,  and  of  the  most  responsible 

227 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

kind.  There  was  no  precise  rule  for  its  guidance.  The  ordi 
nance  which  created  it  endowed  it  with  enormous  powers 
positive  and  discretionary.  Its  difficulties  were  enhanced  by 
the  fact  that  the  Colony  was  in  a  state  of  war.  The  utmost 
prudence,  energy,  and  wisdom  were  required  in  its  head;  and 
these  qualities  Pendleton  possessed  in  an  eminent  degree.  .  .  . 
One  single  act  of  the  committee  excited  in  some  minds  a 
prejudice  against  its  head;  and  justice  to  the  memory  of  Pen 
dleton  demands  a  passing  allusion  to  it.  ...  That  Edmund 
Pendleton  and  Patrick  Henry  were  enemies,  I  do  not  affirm ; 
but  that  they  were  at  the  head  of  their  respective  parties  at 
a  time  when  their  issues  involved  life  and  death,  is  known 
to  all.  .  .  .  Pendleton  represented  the  great  conservative 
interest  of  the  Colony,  and  Henry  personified  the  great  body 
of  the  people,  who,  in  all  countries  and  in  all  ages,  are 
opposed  to  the  few  who  wield  the  influence  of  government 
for  their  own  advantage.  Their  opposition  began  as  early 
as  1765,  and  was  renewed  at  intervals  until  Henry  was  elected 
Governor  and  Pendleton,  after  passing  a  session  or  two  in 
the  House  of  Delegates,  was  called  to  the  Bench.  To  all 
who  are  familiar  with  the  character  of  Pendleton,  it  must 
be  obvious  that  political  animosity  could  never  have  im 
pelled  him  to  seek  the  destruction  of  an  opponent.  .  .  . 
Nor  could  the  success  of  Henry  interfere  in  any  respect  with 
the  ambition  of  Pendleton.  .  .  .  The  success  of  the  arms 
of  the  Colony  was  the  success  of  his  own  policy.  To  blast 
the  fame  or  curb  the  spirit  of  an  officer  under  his  control, 
was  virtually  to  prevent  the  increase  of  his  own  renown  and 
to  dim  the  glory  of  his  own  administration.  ...  To  lead 
a  force  at  that  critical  juncture,  Colonel  Woodford,  Henry's 
second  in  command,  was  highly  qualified.  His  triumphant 
success  justified  the  foresight  of  the  committee.  ...  If 
we  are  disposed  to  attribute  the  conduct  of  Pendleton  and 
his  associates  to  individual  jealousy,  and  to  a  desire  to  ruin  the 
fortunes  of  a  dreaded  rival,  would  they  not  have  adopted 
an  opposite  course,  and  have  despatched  Henry,  unacquainted 
as  he  was  with  war,  through  a  hostile  population  to  the 
seaboard,  where  the  British  forces,  which  had  been  recruited 
some  days  before  by  a  re-inforcement  of  regular  troops  from 
St.  Augustine,  were  ready  to  receive  him?  ...  It  was 
the  general  belief  of  the  time  that  Woodford's  men,  had  he 
been  defeated,  would  have  been  given  over  for  indiscriminate 
massacre  by  the  black  banditti  which  Dunmore  had  listed 
and  armed." 

228 


AS  A  SOLDIER 

This  is  well  reasoned;  but,  in  spite  of  it,  the  fact 
remains  that  Henry  was  grossly  abused.  Nor  can  we 
accept  a  statement,  "  heard  at  second-hand  "  by  Grigsby, 
that  the  real  ground  of  the  Committee's  action  "  was 
the  want  of  discipline  in  the  regiment  under  the  com 
mand  of  Colonel  Henry."  "  My  authority,"  says 
Grigsby,  "  is  the  late  Colonel  Clement  Carrington,  of 
Charlotte,  son  of  Judge  Paul  Carrington.  None  doubted 
his  [Henry's]  courage,  or  his  alacrity  to  hasten  to  the 
field ;  but  it  was  plain  that  he  did  not  seem  to  be  con 
scious  of  the  importance  of  strict  discipline  in  the  army, 
but  regarded  his  soldiers  as  so  many  gentlemen  who  had 
met  to  defend  their  country,  and  exacted  from  them 
little  more  than  the  courtesy  that  was  proper  among 
equals."  Judge  Carrington,  a  member  of  the  Committee, 
may  have  so  informed  his  son ;  but  no  charge  as  to 
lack  of  discipline  was  brought  at  the  time,  or  during 
Henry's  life.  On  the  contrary,  we  have  the  direct 
testimony  of  the  ninety  officers,  some  of  whom  were 
experienced  in  war,  as  to  Henry's  "  firmness  "  in  the 
management  of  the  troops.  It  is  their  own  word,  and 
discredits  all  second-generation  and  second-hand  reports 
that  Henry  was  deficient  in  disciplinary  qualities. 

Manifestly,  any  defence  of  Pendleton  must  be  lame. 
Whatever  his  motives,  he  went  out  of  his  way  to 
further  his  ends.  He  arrogated  to  himself  powers  and 
privileges  to  which  he  had  no  title.  In  stretching 
his  own  authority  he  traversed  the  ordinance  under 
which  Henry  was  commissioned.  The  Committee  was 
a  creature  of  the  Convention ;  therefore  the  Committee, 
or  Pendleton  who  dominated  it,  should  have  respected 
the  Convention's  vote  whereby  Henry  became  Com- 
mander-in-Chief.  Had  Henry  blundered,  or  had  he 
given  signs  of  military  incapacity,  then  it  would  have 
behooved  Pendleton  to  wrestle  with  him  for  a  throw. 
But  he  made  no  blunder.  He  gave  no  sign  of  incom- 

229 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

petence.  Pendleton,  whose  methods  in  this  instance 
were  oblique,  tied  him  up  in  camp.  The  idea  that 
Henry  could  not  be  trusted  to  march  against  Dunmore 
was  a  gratuitous  assumption. 

This  leads  us  to  ask  ourselves :  What  sort  of  officer 
would  Henry  have  made?  Was  he  deluding  himself  in 
thinking  that  he  could  really  make  men  fight  to  win? 
In  his  midnight  reveries  did  he  fondly  see  himself  a 
soldier,  striking  fierce  blows  for  freedom?  Imagina 
tive  men,  as  we  know,  are  apt  to  paint  pillow-pictures, 
and  at  that  time  many  an  American  was  battling  with 
the  British  in  his  dreams.  Henry  had  numerous  quali 
ties  of  high  soldiership.  He  had  a  mighty  spirit.  He 
had  adaptability,  balance,  caution  coupled  with  push, 
the  topographical  sense  so  useful  to  a  soldier,  the 
hunter's  faculty  of  approach  and  surprise,  a  knack  of 
leadership  amounting  almost  to  genius,  and,  most  im 
portant  of  all,  that  peculiar  imagination  which  sees 
around  behind  an  enemy — which  divines  his  purpose, 
estimates  his  advantages  or  difficulties,  and  opens  the 
way  to  elude  him  or  checkmate  him  or  entrap  him. 
This  is  one  side.  On  the  other,  we  find  him  lacking  in 
certain  hard  qualities  that  are  of  use  in  training  and  in 
handling  large  bodies  of  men.  Kindness,  when  regu 
lated  by  the  military  spirit,  as  in  Robert  E.  Lee's  case, 
is  productive  of  good  in  an  army,  but  when  ill-consid 
ered  is  a  danger.  We  find  him,  also,  especially  weak  in 
those  many  practical  things  connected  with  the  science  of 
war  that  made  Drill-master  Steuben  strong — a  strength 
which,  fortunately  for  us,  Steuben  imparted  to  Wash 
ington's  army  at  Valley  Forge.  But,  in  spite  of  his 
lack  of  military  knowledge  in  1775,  why  should  not 
Henry  have  been  a  fairly  good  general  in  1777  or  1780? 
Greene,  a  civilian,  had  long  made  a  study  of  military 
science ;  but  scores  of  officers  knew  as  little  of  fighting 
as  Henry  did.  Knox  was  a  bookseller;  Sullivan,  a 


AS  A  SOLDIER 

lawyer ;  Benjamin  Lincoln,  a  farmer ;  "  Light  Horse  " 
Harry  Lee  was  just  out  of  college.  Why,  then,  should 
not  Henry  have  done  as  well  or  better?  Sumter,  who 
was  so  tiny  at  birth  that  he  could  have  been  cradled 
in  a  quart  pot,  Marion,  Putnam,  Stark,  and  others  were 
just  off  the  farm  when  war  began;  but  they  had  this 
advantage — they  had  served  as  border  rangers,  and 
Henry  had  not  "  That  Henry,"  says  Grigsby,  "  would 
not  have  made  a  better  Indian  fighter  than  Jay,  or  Liv 
ingston,  or  the  Adamses,  that  he  might  not  have  made 
as  dashing  a  partizan  as  Tarleton  or  Simcoe,  his  friends 
might  readily  afford  to  concede;  but  that  he  evinced 
what  neither  Jay,  nor  Livingston,  nor  the  Adamses 
did  evince,  a  determined  resolution  to  stake  his  repu 
tation  and  his  life  on  the  issue  of  arms,  and  that  he 
resigned  his  commission  when  the  post  of  imminent 
danger  was  refused  him,  exhibit  lucid  proof  that,  what 
ever  may  have  been  his  ultimate  fortune,  he  was  not 
deficient  in  two  great  elements  of  military  success : 
personal  enterprise  and  unquestioned  courage." 

But  why  did  so  sagacious  and  wary  a  man  as  Henry 
permit  himself  to  take  a  path  that  led  to  the  pit  of 
humiliation?  When  he  saw  that  he  was  coming  to 
such  a  pit,  why  did  he  not  turn  upon  his  enemies,  whip 
them  off  his  heels,  take  another  trail,  and  go  on  as  he 
wished  to  go  ?  Henry  had  said,  "  Study  men  " — and 
he  certainly  had  studied  Edmund  Pendleton.  Often  had 
they  been  at  odds,  often  had  they  been  in  each  other's 
thoughts  at  midnight ;  but  that  was  in  the  old  times, 
and  now,  as  Henry  assumed,  it  was  shoulder  to  shoulder 
and  all  hands  forward.  With  war  begun,  he  perhaps 
permitted  himself  to  feel  that  there  was  but  one  enemy 
to  consider.  He  did  not  bethink  him  of  revamped 
feuds,  or  count  upon  ambushes  set  by  co-laborers  in  the 
patriot  cause.  When  at  home  in  September,  and  when 
at  camp  during  the  succeeding  months,  he  may  have 

231 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

been  as  eager  to  study  the  art  of  war  as  he  had  been 
to  study  law.  Possibly  he  hoped  to  grasp  one  science 
as  quickly  as  he  had  grasped  the  other.  Did  Sharpens 
"  Military  Guide "  or  Turenne's  "  Memoirs "  make 
harder  reading  than  "  Coke  upon  Littleton  "  ?  If  the 
truth  could  be  known,  we  should  no  doubt  discover  that 
while  Henry  was  encamped  in  rear  of  William  and  Mary 
College,  he  and  his  subordinates  stripped  the  library 
of  its  war-books  as  thoroughly  as  Dunmore  had  stripped 
the  Powder  Horn  of  its  explosives.  Thus  occupied, 
thus  withdrawn  from  politics,  it  did  not  occur  to  him 
to  safeguard  himself  against  attack  at  the  hands  of 
those  whose  duty  it  was  to  assist  him.  When  he  real 
ized  the  situation,  he  could  not  remedy  it  without 
precipitating  a  war  of  factions  that  would  have  injured 
the  cause  he  had  come  to  love.  The  soreness  must 
have  been  deep  with  him ;  and  there  was  much  nobility 
in  his  unrevengefulness  under  chastisement. 


232 


XI 

THE   TURNING-POINT — HOME   FOLKS    AND   FIRST    FAMILY 

HENRY  was  out  of  the  army,  out  of  Congress,  out  of 
public  life.  He  was  at  an  important  turning-point  in 
his  career.  Hence  there  is  occasion  here  for  a  pause — 
there  is  opportunity  to  glance  backward  and  look  for 
ward.  We  have  seen  him  in  the  morning  of  his  life, 
and  at  its  meridian  in  St.  John's  Church ;  hereafter  we 
shall  see  him  in  its  afternoon,  closing  with  the  peace 
ful  and  beautiful  sunset  at  Red  Hill. 

He  was  now  forty.  Half  his  battle  was  over ;  half 
was  to  come.  Hitherto  he  had  used  his  genius  in  a 
warfare  against  despotic  methods ;  now  he  was  to  exer 
cise  his  constructive  and  administrative  talents  in  a 
bold  attempt  at  practical  republicanism. 

It  was  Pendleton  who  affixed  the  pivot  upon  which 
Henry  swung  away  from  national  and  back  into  provin 
cial  endeavor.  In  doing  him  the  disservice  set  forth 
on  preceding  pages,  Pendleton  powerfully  influenced 
Henry's  career.  Jefferson's  subsequent  disservice  merely 
affected  Henry's  fame.  Let  it  be  borne  in  mind  that 
there  were  now  two  planes  of  activity — the  continental 
and  the  State.  If  Henry  had  done  well  as  a  soldier, 
he  would  have  been  acclaimed  for  this  fresh  service  up 
and  down  the  United  Colonies.  But  whether  he  had 
done  well  or  ill,  at  the  end  of  the  war  he  probably  would 
have  reappeared  in  the  national  councils  and  would  have 
been  a  power  in  the  Constitutional  Convention.  Would 
he  not  then  have  figured  in  closer  companionship  with 
Washington  and  Franklin,  who  in  history  dissociate 
themselves  from  State  fame  and  loom  large  on  the  gen 
eral  canvas?  As  the  Union  grows,  local  repute  is  les- 

233 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

sened  and  continental  celebrity  is  correspondingly  mag 
nified.  It  suits  the  writer  of  a  general  history  to  deal 
with  general  characters.  Though  his  national  work 
was  cardinal  in  its  importance,  Henry  remained  in  Vir 
ginia  from  1775  until  his  death.  He  was  on  the  Virginia 
level — not  on  the  continental  level.  Hence  his  fame 
has  suffered  somewhat  at  the  hands  of  historians  who 
overlook  the  State  capitals  in  their  wish  to  pitch  upon 
the  things  that  were  common  to  the  whole  Union.  Few 
historians  do  full  justice  to  Henry's  labors. 

"  I  am  an  American/'  he  had  said,  in  the  First  Con 
gress;  and  so  he  was,  as  long  as  he  lived,  but,  for 
tunately  for  Virginians,  Pendleton  and  circumstances 
forced  him  to  be  more  than  ever  a  Virginian.  It  is  too 
much  to  say  that  he  lost  his  relish  for  Congressional 
life  because  Congress  had  been  a  party -to  the  Pendle- 
tonian  affront.  He  never  nursed  his  wrath.  In  fact, 
we  shall  soon  see  him  working  shoulder  to  shoulder 
with  the  members  of  the  Committee  of  Safety.  His  bow 
to  Pendleton  was  no  less  genial  than  Pendleton's  bow  to 
him.  But  for  some  reason  he  had  no  further  desire  to 
cross  the  Potomac,  and  as  for  military  ambition,  that 
was  a  thing  of  the  past. 

Now,  it  so  happens  that  this  period  of  change  in 
Henry's  public  life  was  also  identical  with  a  time  of 
change  in  his  private  life.  It  was  doubly  a  turning- 
point  with  him;  and,  if  we  consider  his  lapse  in  health 
a  little  later,  it  was  trebly  such.  Let  us  take  account 
of  certain  facts  that  influenced  him;  and  especially  let 
us  get  nearer  to  his  kindred,  some  of  whom  were  notable 
characters  in  the  border  romance  of  the  Revolution. 

Henry  often  joked  with  his  Hanover  neighbors;  and 
perhaps  he  told  them  that  he  had  quit  camp  because  he 
feared  lest  it  should  become  overcrowded  with  his  own 
relatives.  His  brothers-in-law,  Colonel  William  Chris 
tian,  the  Indian  fighter,  Colonel  William  Campbell, 

234 


THE  TURNING  POINT 

afterwards  the  hero  of  King's  Mountain,  Colonel  Valen 
tine  Wood,  Colonel  Thomas  Madison,  and  Colonel 
Samuel  Meredith,  all  saw  service  in  the  Revolution. 
Christian  was  devoted  to  Henry,  and  all  the  others  were 
in  close  friendship  with  him.  His  brother  William,  too, 
was  a  major  of  militia.  Writing  of  Patrick  Henry's 
"  humorous  vein,"  Nathaniel  Pope  says : 

"  I  have  it  on  the  testimony  of  Colonel  Charles  Dabney  that 
Mr.  William  Henry,  brother  of  P.  H.,  paid  the  latter,  when 
Governor,  a  visit  at  his  palace  in  Williamsburg.  After  the 
usual  salutation,  the  Governor,  who  knew  his  brother  wore 
boots  without  stockings,  proposed  to  have  them  taken  off  and 
shoes  or  slippers  substituted.  To  this  William  pointedly  ob 
jected,  observing  he  had  as  lief  wear  boots  as  shoes,  and  would 
not  wish  to  be  troublesome. 

"  '  No  trouble,  brother !  I  insist  upon  it/  replied  the  Gover 
nor. 

"  He  then  peremptorily  ordered  a  servant  to  pull  off  the 
boots,  which,  with  some  difficulty,  he  effected — William  still 
objecting  and  even  making  resistance;  when  a  pair  of  naked 
legs  and  feet  were  displayed,  to  the  great  amusement  of 
the  whole  company,  and  the  no  small  mortification  and  con 
fusion  of  William." 

"  Colonel  Christian,"  says  William  Wirt  Henry,  in 
writing  of  his  grandfather's  military  experience,  "  had 
brought  his  wife  with  him  to  Williamsburg,  and  she 
took  charge  of  her  brother's  headquarters.  Soon  their 
sister,  Elizabeth  Henry,  joined  them,  and  was  a  toast 
among  the  young  officers.  She  was  twenty-six  years 
old,  above  medium  height,  with  a  most  attractive  face 
and  imposing  presence.  Both  in  person  and  intellect 
she  resembled  her  brother.  She  had  the  same  fertile 
and  vivid  imagination,  the  same  ready  command  of  lan 
guage  and  aptness  of  illustration,  the  same  flexibility  of 
voice  and  grace  of  elocution,  and  the  same  play  of 
features  expressive  of  every  phase  of  feeling.  Among 
those  who  brought  companies  to  Williamsburg  was 

235 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

Captain  William  Campbell,  from  the  Holston  settlement 
in  Fincastle  County.  He  was  of  a  superb  physique,  six 
feet  two  inches  high,  straight  and  soldierly  in  his  bear 
ing,  quiet  and  polished  in  his  manners,  and  always  defer 
ential  and  chivalric  towards  women.  He  had  the  fair 
complexion  and  blue  eyes  which  betokened  his  Scotch 
descent.  He  had  been  associated  with  Colonel  Christian 
in  the  Dunmore  expedition  against  the  Indians,  and  was 
destined  to  do  his  country  great  service  in  the  war  upon 
which  they  were  entering.  He  was  welcomed  to  the 
society  of  Colonel  Henry's  family  at  once,  and  it  was 
not  long  before  an  attachment  was  formed  between  him 
self  and  Elizabeth  Henry,  which  resulted  in  their  mar 
riage  the  ensuing  spring.  The  only  child  *  of  this  mar- 

*  Another  child  died  at  the  age  of  five.  Campbell's  character 
is  drawn  in  "  A  Sketch  of  the  Life  of  Elizabeth  Henry,"  by 
her  grandson,  Thomas  L.  Preston.  Campbell's  "  hatred  of 
Tories  was  a  passion."  One  of  these,  knowing  "  dearest 
Betsy's  "  influence  over  the  robust  borderer,  visited  his  house 
to  beg  Mrs.  Campbell  to  intercede  for  him.  During  the  inter 
view  the  front  door  was  opened,  and  in  walked  Colonel  Camp 
bell.  "  A  glance  at  his  face  made  the  Tory  spring  from 
his  seat  and  rush  for  the  back  door.  The  Colonel  whipped 
out  his  sword,  and  was  in  the  act  of  bringing  it  down  with 
all  the  power  of  his  strong  arm  upon  the  Tory's  head,  when 
Mrs.  Campbell  sprung  forward  and  caught  his  upraised  elbow. 
This  made  the  point  of  the  sword  strike  the  lintel  of  the  door, 
and  saved  the  Tory's  head.  So  powerful  was  the  blow  that 
it  cut  a  deep  gash  in  the  hard  oak  lintel  and  bent  the  point 
of  that  celebrated  '  Andrea  de  Ferrara/  The  bend  could  never 
be  entirely  straightened,  and  there  it  remains  to  this  day." 
General  John  S.  Preston  wore  this  ancestral  sword  in  the 
Civil  War.  While  returning  from  church  one  Sunday,  in 
!779>  Campbell  broke  away  from  his  party,  which  was  mounted, 
in  chase  of  an  escaped  Tory,  Frank  Hopkins,  who  leaped 
his  horse  from  a  high  bank  into  the  river.  But  Campbell 
spurred  over  the  cliff  after  him,  and  sat,  breast-deep,  in  the 
stream,  holding  Hopkins  a  prisoner,  till  other  pursuers  came. 
Later,  when  Colonel  Campbell  rejoined  his  wife,  she  eagerly 
inquired,  "  What  did  you  do  with  him,  Mr.  Campbell  ?  "  "  Oh. 

236 


PATRICK  HENRY'S  SISTER  ELIZABETH 

(Married,  first,  General  William  Campbell ;  second,  General 
William  Russell.  In  intellect  and  person  she  was  her  brother 
over  again.  Her  voice  "  carried  "  like  his.  It  rang-  as  clear  as 
a  bell  for  noo  yards  across  a  pond  between  her  own  house  and 
her  daughter's.  Signals  were  used  in  replying.  Her  prayers 
were  as  eloquent  as  Patrick's  speeches.  From  a  pencil-sketch 
owned  by  Mrs.  John  M.  Preston,  Seven-Mile  Ford,  Va.) 


THE  TURNING  POINT 

riage  was  Sarah  Buchanan,  who  married  General 
Francis  Preston.  Her  descendants  have  been  remark 
able  for  eloquence,  the  most  celebrated  among  them 
being  her  oldest  son,  William  Campbell  Preston.  Mrs. 
Campbell  afterward  married  General  William  Russell, 
and  by  her  talents  and  practical  piety  became  known 
as  the  Lady  Huntingdon  of  Virginia." 

This  camp  romance  passed  into  a  fireside  tale  in  the 
South,  and  many  who  thus  heard  the  love-story  of  their 
grandmother  lived  to  become  famous  in  literature,  in 
law,  or  in  war.  One  can  imagine  Henry's  keen  interest 
in  the  courtship.  It  is  seen  from  his  letters  that  his 
sisters  were  very  dear  to  him.  As  for  his  mother,  her 
sweetness  of  character  and  her  contented  old  age  were 
for  a  long  time  a  balm  and  a  benefaction  to  his  spirit. 
Sarah  Syme  Henry  looked  about  her  when  she  grew 
gray,  and  saw  all  her  children  doing  well.  One  of  them, 
especially,  seemed  to  her  to  be  an  object  of  pride,  but 
she  was  so  sincere  in  her  piety  that  she  measured  Patrick 
only  by  the  good  he  was  doing  or  might  do.  She  lived 
in  Hanover  with  her  eldest  daughter,  Jane,  Colonel 
Meredith's  wife,  visiting  from  time  to  time  at  the  homes 
of  her  other  children.  Except  Sarah,  who  had  married 
an  Englishman,  all  were  within  reach.  Here  is  her 
only  existing  letter,  written  to  a  friend  (the  wife  of 
Colonel  William  Fleming)  after  her  return  from  Bote- 
tourt,  whence  her  son-in-law,  Colonel  Christian,  had 
just  gone  against  the  Indians: 

"  15  October,  1774. 

"  DEAR  MADAM  :  Kind  Providence  preserved  me  and  all  with 
me  [Mrs.  Anne  Christian  and  her  little  ones]  safe  to  our  Home 
in  Hanover.  Here  people  have  been  very  sickly,  but  hope 
the  sickly  season  is  nigh  over.  My  dear  Annie  has  been  ailing 

we  hung  him,  Betty — that's  all ! "  Lyman  C.  Draper,  in 
"  King's  Mountain  and  its  Heroes,"  tells  a  great  deal  about 
William  Campbell. 

237 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

two  or  three  days  with  a  fever.  The  dear  children  are  very 
well.  My  son  Patrick  has  gone  to  Philadelphia  near  seven 
weeks.  The  affairs  are  kept  with  great  secrecy,  nobody  being 
allowed  to  be  present.  I  assure  you  we  have  our  lowland  fears 
and  troubles  with  respect  to  Great  Britain.  Perhaps  our  good 
God  may  bring  us  out  of  these  many  troubles  which  threaten 
us  not  only  from  the  mountains  but  the  seas.  ...  I  am, 
dear  madam,  your  humble  servant, 

"  SARAH  HENRY." 

Accompanying  the  Merediths  to  a  new  home  in 
Amherst,  she  lived  ten  years  longer.  In  her  will  she 
directed  that  mourning  rings  be  given  to  all  her  chil 
dren.  It  was  said  of  her  that  to  her  five  talents  she  had 
added  five.  "  My  dear  and  ever  honored  mother  died 
six  or  eight  weeks  ago,"  wrote  Henry  in  the  course  of 
a  letter  to  Judge  Bartholomew  Dandridge,  "  my  brother 
William  two  weeks,  and  my  only  surviving  aunt  ten 
days.  Thus  is  the  last  generation  clearing  the  way  for 
us,  as  we  must  shortly  do  for  the  next."* 

But  in  the  wish  to  put  these  family  portraits  plainly 
before  us,  so  that  we  may  go  on  to  other  matters,  we 
have  anticipated  somewhat.  Reverting  to  "  Scotch- 
town  "  and  the  spring  of  1776,  we  find  Henry  under 
bereavement.  He  had  just  lost  the  wife  of  his  youth — 
his  good  mate  for  twenty-one  years.  Sarah  Shelton 
was  much  missed,  much  lamented.  She  had  borne  him 
three  sons  and  three  daughters,  the  eldest  of  whom, 
Martha,  already  married  to  Colonel  John  Fontaine,  took 
charge  of  her  father's  household.  Martha  was  a  life 
long  favorite  with  him.  Anne,  who  subsequently  mar 
ried  Judge  Spencer  Roane,  was  at  this  time  a  young 
girl,  as  was  Elizabeth,  later  the  wife  of  Philip  Aylett 
and  the  mother  of  the  brilliant  young  orator,  Patrick 
Henry  Aylett,  a  victim  of  the  Richmond  Theatre  fire. 

*  "  Died,  Rev.  Patrick  Henry,  rector  of  St.  Paul's  Parish,  in 
Hanover,  April  n." — Virginia  Gazette,  1777. 

238 


THE  TURNING  POINT 

"  Scotchtown  "  house  still  stands.  No  architect  who 
is  interested  in  colonial  structures  but  would  delight  to 
"  restore "  it ;  and  perhaps  we  too  should  find  some 
pleasure  in  attempting  to  bring  it  back  to  mind  just  as 
it  was  when  Patrick  Henry  lived  there.  He  had  been 
familiar  with  this  part  of  Hanover  since  his  boyhood; 
"  Mount  Brilliant  "  was  only  a  morning's  ride  away ; 
and  in  going  to  and  from  the  Forks  church  with  his 
mother,  he  had  frequently  passed  along  the  county  road 
which  skirts  the  "  Scotchtown  "  plantation.  The  big 
brick  Forks  church  looks  as  though  a  century  and  a 
half  had  merely  solidified  it,  and  some  of  the  trees  that 
stood  then  stand  now.  To  the  south  a  few  miles  runs 
the  South  Anna  River,  and  to  the  north  the  North 
Anna,  both  streams  clear  in  dry  weather,  but  red  and 
rapid  when  rains  drench  the  rolling  land.  The  hilly 
roads  are  red.  Rocks  abound ;  and  there  is  much 
romance  in  the  leap  of  waters,  the  beautiful  foliage  on 
the  high  banks  of  the  streams,  and  the  general  aspect 
of  a  region  rich  in  hills,  ravines,  forests,  and  pleasant 
fields.  But  there  is  a  sudden  slipping  down  from  high 
romance  when  we  learn  the  name  of  the  Patrick  Henry 
neighborhood.  It  is  "  Negrofoot."  Negrofoot  road 
was  the  one  followed  by  Henry  in  his  Louisa  County 
pilgrimages.  Back  of  the  name  is  a  grim  tale  that  has 
caused  many  a  child  to  cuddle  down  under  the  bed 
clothes  and  cover  up  its  head.  There  was  a  black  man, 
new  come  from  Africa,  and  he  seemed  particularly  fond 
of  a  certain  baby.  He  fed  the  baby  fat.  And  still  he 
fattened  it.  ...  By  and  by  this  negro's  foot  was 
seen  staked  as  a  warning  on  the  highway.  It  was  the 
first  known  instance  of  cannibalism  in  Virginia,  and  it 
was  likewise  the  last,  for  the  vengeful  news  of  the 
spiked  foot  spread  from  plantation  to  plantation,  and 
the  strange  sign  was  talked  of  near  and  far. 

It  was  a  Scotchman,  Colonel  Chiswell,  who  built 
239 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

"  Scotchtown,"  with  its  hall,  its  mills,  its  storehouses, 
and  its  cabins.  Around  him  were  his  thousand  acres. 
He  liked  broad  spaces  indoors  as  well  as  out.  From 
the  stone-paved  floor  of  his  front  porch  he  had  a  sweep 
ing  view  towards  the  north,  and  from  a  similar  porch 
on  the  south  side,  with  its  flagged  steps  leading  down, 
he  could  treat  his  eye  to  a  stretch  of  green  fields  bor 
dered  by  forest  trees ;  for  he  had  pitched  this  queer  old- 
world  house  on  a  broad-topped  hill  gently  sloping  in 
every  direction.  He  had  built  a  hall-like  frame  structure 
of  extraordinary  length,  with  a  basement  that  contained 
a  "  dungeon  " ;  above  the  basement  he  had  arranged 
eight  large  rooms,  opening  into  a  wide  passage,  and 
above  these  an  immense  garret,  which,  if  unpartitioned 
then  as  it  is  now,  was  spacious  enough  to  accommodate 
all  the  dancers  in  Hanover.  There  were  doors  of 
walnut,  and  the  hall  and  living-rooms  were  panelled 
in  walnut  from  floor  to  ceiling.  There  were  corner 
fireplaces,  with  marble  mantels  and  marble  fronts,  show 
ing  fluted  columns.  From  this  lordly  lodge  in  the 
wilderness,  where  in  later  years  lived  Sarah  Gary,  who 
gave  up  her  jewels  to  the  patriot  cause,  where  Dolly 
Payne  Madison's  childhood  was  spent,  and  where  a 
certain  terrible  Mr.  Forsythe  is  said  to  have  chained 
his  wife  in  the  "  dungeon  " — though  in  our  souls  we 
believe  it  was  a  sweet-potato  pit — the  gallant  Colonel 
Chiswell  was  accustomed  to  ride  in  his  coach  down 
Negrofoot  road  to  Williamsburg,  where,  in  the  season, 
he  enjoyed  the  companionship  of  the  bloods.  But,  as 
the  story  goes,  in  a  quarrel  at  table  he  killed  a  man,  and 
became  a  convict.* 

*  Apparently  this  "  Scotchtown "  Chiswell  is  identical  with 
the  Colonel  Chiswell  who  attempted  unsuccessfully  to  extract 
silver  from  lead  ore  in  Wythe  County.  Howe  says :  "  He 
killed  a  man  in  a  quarrel  and  died  in  prison."  Doubtless,  Fort 
Chiswell  took  his  name. 

240 


THE  TURNING  POINT 

Henry  next  owned  the  place ;  then  Gary ;  then  Payne. 
In  the  "  Memoirs  and  Letters  of  Dolly  Madison  "  we 
have  a  pleasing  bit  about  "  Scotchtown."  Note  the 
reference  to  the  number  of  rooms,  which  would  indicate 
that  the  garret  aforementioned  was  cut  up  into  cham 
bers.  "  Towards  the  close  of  her  life,"  says  the 
"  Memoirs,"  "  Mrs.  Madison  frequently  recalled  the 
home  of  her  childhood,  dwelling  upon  the  great  black 
marble  mantelpieces,  supported  by  white  figures.  The 
house  .  .  .  was  surrounded  by  a  number  of  small 
brick  houses,  attached  to  the  main  building,  which  was 
very  large,  having  as  many  as  twenty  rooms  on  a  floor. 
.  .  .  The  little  country  school  to  which  Dolly  wended 
her  way  for  the  first  twelve  years  was  of  the  simplest 
description.  Equipped  with  a  white  linen  mask  to  keep 
every  ray  of  sunshine  from  the  complexion,  a  sun- 
bonnet  sewed  on  her  head  every  morning  by  her  careful 
mother,  and  long  gloves  covering  the  hands  and  arms, 
one  can  see  the  prim  little  figure  starting  off  for  school, 
with  books  under  her  arm,  and  the  dear  but  wicked 
baubles  safely  hidden  beneath  the  severely  plain  Quaker 
dress."  Her  parents  were  Friends,  but  her  grand 
mother,  once  a  great  beauty  and  belle,  was  not;  and 
this  worldly  grandmother  had  given  her  the  "  wicked 
baubles  " — otherwise  some  charming  old  jewels — which 
Dolly  surreptitiously  kept  in  a  bag.  "  Almost  the  first 
grief  of  her  childhood,"  adds  the  "  Memoirs,"  "  was 
the  loss  of  this  precious  bag,  discovered  in  school,  after 
a  long  ramble  through  the  woods,  during  which  the 
string  must  have  become  unfastened,  scattering  the 
treasure  where  days  of  searching  proved  of  no  avail." 

"  Scotchtown "  commended  itself  to  Henry  for  his 
ailing  wife's  sake,  because  it  was  reputed  to  be  healthy, 
and  for  the  sake  of  their  children,  because  it  gave  them  a 
playground  where  they  could  start  a  deer,  swim,  angle, 
shoot,  ride,  and  occasionally  track  a  bear. 
16  241 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

"  In  the  management  of  children,"  says  Colonel  Mere 
dith,  "  Mr.  Henry  seemed  to  think  the  most  important 
thing  is  in  the  first  place  to  give  them  good  constitu 
tions.  They  were  six  or  seven  years  old  before  they 
were  permitted  to  wear  shoes,  and  thirteen  or  fourteen 
before  they  were  confined  to  books  or  received  any  kind 
of  literary  instruction.  In  the  meantime  they  were  as 
wild  as  young  colts,  and  permitted  to  run  quite  at  large. 
He  seemed  to  think  that  nature  ought  to  be  permitted 
to  give  and  show  its  own  impulse,  and  that  then  it  is 
our  duty  to  pursue  it.  His  children  were  on  the  most 
familiar  footing  with  him,  and  he  treated  them  as  com 
panions  and  friends."  *  "  Mr.  Meredith's  statement  is 
in  a  great  measure  true,"  comments  Judge  Roane,  hus 
band  of  one  of  these  Scotchtown  girls,  "  but  they  were 
sent  to  school  before  thirteen  or  fourteen.  I  have 
thought  Mr.  Henry  was  not  sufficiently  attentive  to  the 
education  of  his  children,  which  I  ascribed  to  the  great 
facility  with  which  he  acquired  his  own  education." 

Scattered  about  "  Scotchtown  "  plantation  were  cabins 
enough  to  shelter  thirty  slaves,  who  did  the  farm-work, 
mill-work,  and  much  of  the  housework.  It  was  an 
independent  community  with  a  life  of  its  own;  and  if 
Patrick  Henry's  sons — John,  William,  and  Edward — 
did  not  have  many  friends  among  the  black  people,  they 
differed  from  most  of  the  plantation-bred  boys  of  their 
day  and  generation.  John,  in  time,  had  a  family  of 
his  own ;  but  not  so  William ;  and  Edward — the 
"  Neddy "  of  affectionate  references  in  his  father's 


*  "  His  brother-in-law,  Colonel  Thomas  Madison,"  says  Judge 
W.  H.  Cabell,  "  gave  me  information  as  to  his  conduct  to  his 
children.  Colonel  Madison  could  not  refrain  from  laughing 
when  he  described  the  appearance  and  manners  of  his  sons 
before  they  arrived  at  the  age  of  14 — bareheaded,  barefooted, 
hallooing  and  whooping  about  the  plantation  in  every  direction, 
and  as  rough  as  nature  left  them." 

242 


THE  TURNING  POINT 

letters — died  in  his  youth.  The  daughters  became  the 
mothers  of  distinguished  men.  Henry  seems  to  have 
trained  his  girls  with  especial  care.  His  letter  to  Anne 
when  she  married  Spencer  Roane  is  an  Eighteenth 
Century  model  of  its  kind.  The  light  it  throws  upon 
his  own  character  adds  to  its  interest.  It  runs: 

"Mv  DEAR  DAUGHTER:  You  have  just  entered  into  that 
state  which  is  replete  with  happiness  or  misery.  The  issue 
depends  upon  that  prudent,  amiable,  uniform  conduct  which 
wisdom  and  virtue  so  strongly  recommend  on  the  one  hand, 
or  on  that  imprudence  which  a  want  of  reflection  or  passion 
may  prompt  on  the  other. 

"  You  are  allied  to  a  man  of  honor,  of  talents,  and  of  an 
open,  generous  disposition.  You  have,  therefore,  in  your  power 
all  the  essential  ingredients  of  happiness;  it  cannot  be  marred, 
if  you  now  reflect  upon  that  system  of  conduct  which  you 
ought  invariably  to  pursue — if  you  now  see  clearly  the  path 
from  which  you  will  resolve  never  to  deviate.  Our  conduct 
is  often  the  result  of  whim  or  caprice — often  such  as  will 
give  us  many  a  pang,  unless  we  see  beforehand  what  is 
always  the  most  praiseworthy,  and  the  most  essential  to 
happiness. 

"  The  first  maxim  which  you  should  impress  upon  your 
mind  is  never  to  attempt  to  control  your  husband,  by  opposi 
tion,  by  displeasure,  or  any  other  mark  of  anger.  A  man  of 
sense,  of  prudence,  of  warm  feelings,  cannot,  and  will  not, 
bear  an  opposition  of  any  kind  which  is  attended  with  an 
angry  look  or  expression.  The  current  of  his  affections  is 
suddenly  stopped;  his  attachment  is  weakened;  he  begins  to 
feel  a  mortification  the  most  pungent ;  he  is  belittled  in  his 
own  eyes ;  and  be  assured  that  the  wife  who  once  excites  those 
sentiments  in  the  breast  of  a  husband  will  never  regain  the 
high  ground  which  she  might  and  ought  to  have  retained. 
When  he  marries  her,  if  he  be  a  good  man,  he  expects  from 
her  smiles,  not  frowns ;  he  expects  to  find  her  one  who  is 
not  to  control  him — not  to  take  from  him  the  freedom  of 
acting  as  his  own  judgment  shall  direct,  but  one  who  will 
place  such  confidence  in  him  as  to  believe  that  his  prudence  is 
his  best  guide.  Little  things,  that  in  reality  are  mere  trifles 
in  themselves,  often  produce  bickerings  and  even  quarrels. 
Never  permit  them  to  be  a  subject  of  dispute;  yield  them  with 
pleasure,  with  a  smile  of  affection.  Be  assured,  one  difference 

243 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

outweighs  them  all  a  thousand,  or  ten  thousand,  times.  A 
difference  with  your  husband  ought  to  be  considered  as  the 
greatest  calamity — as  one  that  is  to  be  studiously  guarded 
against ;  it  is  a  demon  which  must  never  be  permitted  to 
enter  a  habitation  where  all  should  be  peace,  unimpaired  con 
fidence,  and  heartfelt  affection.  Besides,  what  can  a  woman 
gain  by  her  opposition  or  her  indifference?  Nothing.  But 
she  loses  everything;  she  loses  her  husband's  respect  for  her 
virtues,  she  loses  his  love,  and  with  that,  all  prospect  of 
future  happiness.  She  creates  her  own  misery,  and  then 
utters  idle  and  silly  complaints,  but  utters  them  in  vain. 

"  The  love  of  a  husband  can  be  retained  only  by  the  high 
opinion  which  he  entertains  of  his  wife's  goodness  of  heart, 
of  her  amiable  disposition,  of  the  sweetness  of  her  temper, 
of  her  prudence,  of  her  devotion  to  him.  Let  nothing  upon 
any  occasion  ever  lessen  that  opinion.  On  the  contrary,  it 
should  augment  every  day;  he  should  have  much  more  reason 
to  admire  her  for  those  excellent  qualities  which  will  cast  a 
lustre  over  a  virtuous  woman  whose  personal  attractions  are 
no  more.  .  .  . 

"  Cultivate  your  mind  by  the  perusal  of  those  books  which 
instruct  while  they  amuse.  Do  not  devote  much  of  your  time 
to  novels.  .  .  .  History,  geography,  poetry,  moral  essays, 
biography,  travels,  sermons,  and  other  well-written  religious 
productions  will  not  fail  to  enlarge  your  understanding,  to 
render  you  a  more  agreeable  companion,  and  to  exalt  your 
virtue. 

"  Mutual  politeness  between  the  most  intimate  friends  is 
essential  to  that  harmony  which  should  never  be  broken  or 
interrupted.  How  important,  then,  it  is  between  man  and 
wife!  ...  I  will  add  that  matrimonial  happiness  does 
not  depend  upon  wealth ;  no,  it  is  not  to  be  found  in  wealth,  but 
in  minds  properly  tempered  and  united  to  our  respective 
situations.  Competency  is  necessary.  All  beyond  that  is 
ideal.  .  .  . 

"  In  the  management  of  your  domestic  concerns,  let  pru 
dence  and  wise  economy  prevail.  Let  neatness,  order,  and 
judgment  be  seen  in  all  your  different  departments.  Unite 
liberality  with  a  just  frugality;  always  reserve  something  for 
the  hand  of  charity;  and  never  let  your  door  be  closed  to  the 
voice  of  suffering  humanity.  Your  servants  especially  will 
have  the  strongest  claim  upon  your  charity ;  let  them  be  well 
fed,  well  clothed,  nursed  in  sickness,  and  let  them  never  be 
unjustly  treated." 

244 


THE  TURNING  POINT 

It  is  a  tradition  among  the  Henry  negroes,  who  now 
for  the  most  part  dwell  in  the  Staunton  River  country, 
that  their  grandparents  were  treated  just  as  Patrick 
Henry  here  admonishes  his  daughter  to  treat  them. 
But  it  may  be  said:  How  could  Henry  find  it  in  him 
to  hold  slaves?  How  inconsistent  that  this  champion 
of  freedom  should  be  a  party  to  the  vassalage  of  human 
beings!  Liberty  was  the  key-note  of  all  his  political 
acts.  What  incongruity,  therefore,  have  we  here! 
How  did  Henry  reconcile  his  combative  advocacy  of 
the  rights  of  man  with  his  own  petty  overlordship  of 
men?  There  is  a  dampening  paradox  in  the  matter; 
we  do  not  like  it ;  our  tender  modern  feelings  are  hurt. 
We  who  know  very  well  that  terrible  evils  exist  to-day, 
and  that  we  enjoy  our  dinners  in  spite  of  these  evils, 
are  disposed  to  blame  Henry.  We  do  not  blame  Wash 
ington  and  other  worthies  on  this  score  quite  so  much ; 
but  then,  they  were  less  fervid  in  their  utterances.  It 
seems  to  comport  with  the  character  of  Washington 
that  he  should  have  held  slaves.  Besides,  as  Henry 
Lee  said  of  him :  "  He  moves  in  his  own  orbit."  But 
slave-holding  does  not  harmonize  with  Henry's  char 
acter.  In  Patrick  Henry's  case  we  see  an  incongruity, 
forgetting  that  the  incongruity  is  due  to  vast  changes 
wrought  in  custom,  and  is  in  no  wise  chargeable  to  the 
man  himself. 

In  point  of  fact,  Henry's  record  on  slavery  is  admir 
able.  His  opinion  of  it  was  well  voiced  by  the  Rev. 
Jonathan  Boucher,  a  plain-spoken  man,  afterwards 
Vicar  of  Epsom,  in  Surrey,  England,  who  at  Bray's, 
in  Hanover,  as  early  as  1763,  told  the  people  from  the 
pulpit  that  slavery  was  an  economic  drawback  and  an 
evil.  "  I  am  far  from  recommending  it  to  you  at  once 
to  set  all  the  slaves  free,"  he  said,  "  because  to  do  so 
would  be  a  heavy  loss  to  you  and  probably  no  gain  to 
them ;  but  I  do  entreat  you  to  make  them  some  amends 

245 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

for  the  drudgery  of  their  bodies  by  cultivating  their 
minds."  He  advocated  gradual  emancipation,  adding: 
"  The  free  labor  of  a  free  man  who  is  regularly  hired 
and  paid  for  the  work  he  does,  and  only  for  what  he 
does,  is  in  the  end  cheaper  than  the  eye-service  of  a 
slave."  Henry  and  others  tried  to  stop  the  importation 
of  slaves.  But  all  laws  passed  to  that  end  were  dis 
allowed  by  the  King  of  England,  who  drew  a  revenue 
from  the  business.  First  break  the  hold  of  the  King, 
argued  Henry ;  after  that,  let  other  reforms  be  insti 
tuted.  "  The  disadvantages  from  the  great  number  of 
slaves  may  perhaps  wear  off,"  he  wrote,  "  when  the 
present  stock  and  their  descendants  are  scattered  through 
the  immense  deserts  in  the  West.  To  re-export  them 
is  now  impracticable,  and  sorry  I  am  for  it." 

If  Henry  looked  out  towards  Chestnut  Street  when 
he  was  in  Carpenters'  Hall,  Philadelphia,  as  a  member 
of  the  First  Continental  Congress,  his  glance  must  have 
rested  upon  a  notable  dwelling  known  as  the  Benezet 
house.  Here  lived  a  Frenchman  who  saw  how  good  it 
would  be  for  America  if  slavery  could  be  destroyed. 
He  wrote  a  book  to  that  effect;  Robert  Pleasants  sent 
a  copy  of  the  book  to  Henry,  and  Henry's  letter 
acknowledging  the  courtesy  is  now  in  the  possession 
of  Mrs.  Matthew  Bland  Harrison,  at  Red  Hill.  It  reads  : 


"  HANOVER,  Jan?  i8th,  1773. 
"DEAR   SIR. 

"  I  take  this  Oppertunity  to  acknowledge  y6  receit  of  An 
thony  Benezets  Book  against  the  Slave  Trade.  I  thank  you 
for  it.  It  is  not  a  little  surprising  that  Christianity,  whose 
chief  excellence  consists  in  softening  the  human  Heart,  in 
cherishing  &  improving  its  finer  Feelings,  should  encourage 
a  Practice  so  totally  repugnant  to  the  first  Impressions  of  right 
&  wrong:  what  adds  to  the  wonder  is,  that  this  abominable 
Practice  has  been  introduced  in  the  most  enlightened  Ages. 
Times  that  seem  to  have  pretentions  to  boast  of  high  Improve 
ments  in  the  Arts,  Sciences  &  refined  Morality,  have  brought 

246 


THE  TURNING  POINT 

into  general  Use,  &  guarded  by  many  Laws,  a  Species  of 
Violence  &  Tyranny,  which  our  more  rude  and  barbarous, 
but  more  honest  Ancestors  detested;  is  it  not  amazing,  that 
at  a  time  when  the  rights  of  Humanity  are  defined  &  under 
stood  with  precision  in  a  Country  above  all  others  fond  of 
Liberty :  that  in  such  an  Age  and  such  a  Country,  we  find 
Men,  professing  a  Religion  the  most  humane,  mild,  meek, 
gentle  &  generous,  adopting  a  Principle  as  repugnant  to  human 
ity,  as  it  is  inconsistant  with  the  Bible  &  destructive  to  Lib 
erty. — 

14  Every  thinking  honest  Man  rejects  it  in  Speculation,  how 
few  in  Practice  from  consciencious  Motives?  The  World  in 
general  has  denied  your  People  a  share  of  its  Honours,  but 
the  Wise  will  ascribe  to  you  a  just  Tribute  of  Virtuous  Praise, 
for  the  Practice  of  a  train  of  Virtues  among  which  your  dis 
agreement  to  Slavery  will  be  principally  ranked. 

"  I  cannot  but  wish  well  to  a  People,  whose  System  imitates 
the  Example  of  him  whose  Life  was  perfect. — And  believe 
me  I  shall  honour  the  Quakers  for  their  noble  Effort  to  abolish 
Slavery.  It  is  equally  calculated  to  promote  moral  &  political 
Good. — 

"  Would  any  one  believe  that  I  am  Master  of  Slaves  of  my 
own  purchase !  I  am  drawn  along  by  ye  general  Inconvenience 
of  living  without  them;  I  will  not,  I  cannot  justify  it.  How 
ever  culpable  my  Conduct,  I  will  so  far  pay  my  devoir  to  Vir 
tue,  as  to  own  the  excellence  &  rectitude  of  her  Precepts  &  to 
lament  my  want  of  conformity  to  them. — 

"  I  believe  a  time  will  come  when  an  oppertunity  will  be 
offered  to  abolish  this  lamentable  Evil. — Every  thing  we  can 
do,  is  to  improve  it  if  it  happens  in  our  day,  if  not,  let  us  trans 
mit  to  our  descendants  together  with  our  Slaves  a  pity  for 
their  unhappy  Lot,  and  an  abhorrence  for  Slavery. — 

"  If  we  cannot  reduce  this  wished  for  Reformation  to  practice, 
let  us  treat  the  unhappy  Victims  with  lenity,  it  is  the  furthest 
advance  we  can  make  towards  Justice.  It  is  a  debt  we  owe  to 
the  purity  of  our  Religion  to  shew  that  it  is  at  variance  with 
that  law  which  warrants  Slavery.  ...  I  exhort  you  to  per 
severe  in  so  worthy  a  resolution ;  some  of  your  People  disagree 
or  at  least  are  lukewarm  in  the  abolition  of  Slavery.  Many 
treat  the  Resolution  of  your  Meeting  with  ridicule :  and  among 
those  who  throw  contempt  on  it  are  Clergymen,  whose  surest 
Guard  against  both  Ridicule  &  Contempt  is  a  certain  Act  of 
Assembly. 

"  I  know  not  when  to  stop.  I  would  say  many  things  on  this 
247 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

Subject,  a  serious  review  of  which  gives  a  gloomy  perspective 
to  future  times.  Excuse  this  scrawl  &  believe  me  with 
esteem, 

"  Yr  hbl.  Serv*, 

"  PATRICK  HENRY,  JUNF. 
"  ROBERT  PLEASANTS/' 

If  Henry  had  manumitted  his  slaves,  and  had  led  in 
an  abolition  movement,  what  would  have  happened? 
He  might  have  triumphed  in  the  end,  but  the  likelihood 
is  that  he  would  have  failed,  and  would  have  brought 
mischief,  instead  of  strength,  into  the  grand  general 
movement  for  American  autonomy.  One  thing  at  a 
time  is  the  part  of  common-sense — especially  when  that 
thing  involves  a  matter  of  such  magnitude  as  the  birth 
of  a  nation.  Patrick  Henry's  battle  was  to  prevent 
what  he  regarded  as  the  enslavement  of  the  white  people 
of  the  new  world.  His  discernment  was  not  at  fault 
when  it  told  him  that  the  black  people  must  wait.  It 
was  a  "  gloomy  perspective  " ;  but  the  hour  had  not 
come  to  attempt  the  overthrow  of  the  domestic  evil. 

Many  Virginians  besides  Boucher  and  Henry  agreed 
with  Benezet.  This  was  especially  so  after  reflective 
minds  had  become  imbued  with  Henry's  thoughts,  and 
their  own  answering  thoughts,  upon  the  inviolability  of 
individual  rights.  Concurrently  with  the  demand  for 
political  freedom  arose  the  demand  for  religious  liberty ; 
and  soon  Jefferson  successfully  attacked  the  law  of 
entail.  Disenthralment  was  the  order  of  the  age.  Men 
talked  of  great  movements;  and  some  felt  that  black 
bondage  would  go  by  the  board  before  the  end  of  the 
century.  Perhaps  it  would  have  gone  by  the  board  but 
for  one  enormous  happening — the  French  Revolution. 
The  American  Revolution  did  much  to  bring  on  the 
Revolution  in  France,  and  this,  in  turn,  reacted  upon 
America.  On  a  later  page  we  shall  attempt  to  show 
how  the  reaction  affected  Henry's  politics ;  it  is  enough 

248 


THE  TURNING  POINT 

here  to  say  that  it  interrupted  some  generous  and  noble 
movements,  and  among  them  that  for  manumission. 

Henry,  the  "  half-Quaker,"  as  Roger  Atkinson  called 
him,  was  no  hero  in  the  matter  of  slavery;  but  another 
owner  of  "  Scotchtown,"  an  out-and-out  Quaker,  did 
the  heroic  thing,  and  paid  a  dear  price  for  the  dole  of 
glory  given  him  by  a  neglectful  world.  This  was  John 
Payne,  father  of  Mrs.  Madison.  His  conscience  troubled 
him ;  like  Warner  Mifflin,  who  was  the  first  of  the 
Friends  to  manumit  black  people,  the  Hanover  Quaker 
gave  all  his  slaves  their  liberty — moved  to  Philadelphia, 
failed,  sank  under  his  troubles,  and  died  a  heart-broken 
man. 

At  this  pivotal  period  there  was  a  break  in  Henry's 
health.  In  the  summer  and  fall  of  1776,  malarial  fever 
kept  him  in  bed  at  "  Scotchtown  "  for  several  weeks. 
We  hear  much  of  the  ague,  or  "  chills  and  fever,"  in 
connection  with  the  Virginia  lowlands.  The  contrast 
between  the  sallow  skin  of  the  tidewater  people  and 
the  ruddy  faces  of  the  mountaineers  was  remarked  by 
the  Marquis  de  Chastellux,  a  wholesome-minded 
Frenchman,  one  of  the  Forty  Immortals,  who  loved 
America,  who  liked  to  travel  here,  and  who  knew  what 
not  to  see  and  say  as  well  as  what  to  set  forth  in  his 
charming  pages.  These  pages  go  far  to  prove  that  the 
Eighteenth  Century  quill  had  more  flexibility  than  the 
modern  pen;  but,  however  that  may  be,  there  was 
much  flexibility,  much  grace,  much  wit,  in  our  ally's 
letters— even  if  he  did  make  the  rabbits  of  Patrick 
Henry's  country  climb  trees.  Parts  of  lower  Hanover 
are  underlaid  with  a  stratum  of  blue  clay,  which  holds 
water  as  in  a  basin.  This  water  stagnates,  showing  a 
green  scum.  Or  it  evaporates,  and  at  times  white  mists 
arise.  McClellan's  men  could  not  throw  oft  the  malarial 
enemy  that  enveloped  them  in  the  Chickahominy  region, 
and  they  fell  in  thousands  under  its  noiseless  night 

249 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

assaults.  Even  acclimated  dwellers  in  the  low  parts 
eat  quinine  out  of  the  hand  as  they  do  sugar.  Henry 
had  no  quinine.  In  that  day  rum  with  red  pepper, 
rum  with  garlic,  rum  with  many  other  ingredients,  took 
its  place.  But  the  malarial  country  has  its  lush  beauty 
when  it  comes  to  trees,  vines,  and  flowers,  and  the 
enemy  dies  at  the  first  touch  of  frost.  Therefore  the 
Hanover  lowlands  were  braved  by  the  colonial  settlers, 
and  even  the  "  chills  "  seemed  to  be  good  in  that  they 
gave  excuse  for  importing  more  Madeira,  and  more 
Madeira  still. 

Apparently  Henry  was  never  quite  so  sure  of  his 
health  after  this  attack  as  he  had  been  prior  to  his 
prostration.  He  longed  for  the  mountains — the  wilder 
ness.  There  was  a  great  deal  of  Daniel  Boone's  nature 
in  him.  So,  though  he  loved  Hanover,  he  soon  left 
the  north  side  for  the  south  side  of  the  James.  Once 
he  contemplated  a  return  to  his  native  county;  but  he 
moved  in  another  direction,  and  hereafter  we  are  to 
find  him  identified  with  the  south-western  parts  of 
Virginia.  "  He  had  a  real  talent  in  making  bargains," 
wrote  Spencer  Roane.  "  Scotchtbwn  "  had  cost  him 
but  £600.  How  he  sold  it  is  thus  mentioned  in  the 
narrative  of  Nathaniel  Pope: 

"  I  have  been  informed  that  Mr.  Henry  advanced  his  Fortune 
very  considerably  by  an  advantageous  sale  of  his  seat  in  Han 
over  called  '  Scotchtown  '  to  Colonel  Wilson  Miles  Gary,  when 
a  number  of  wealthy  citizens  from  the  neighborhood  of 
Williamsburg  and  York,  apprehending  danger  from  the  enemy, 
removed  to  this  county  and  very  much  enhanced  the  price  of 
land." 


250 


XII 

AS  A  CONSTRUCTIVE  STATESMAN 

HARDLY  had  Henry  got  rid  of  his  uniform  and  looked 
around  awhile  among  his  neighbors,  when  the  appre 
ciative  freeholders  of  Hanover  delegated  him  to  go  with 
his  half-brother,  Syme,  to  the  Convention  then  soon  to 
be  held.  It  was  clear  that  vital  happenings  must  hinge 
upon  the  acts  of  this  Convention;  hence  contests  for 
seats  therein  enlivened  some  of  the  court-house  greens. 
Independence  was  the  leading  issue.  Charlotte  County 
was  urgent  and  specific  in  its  demand  for  an  immediate 
declaration,  thus  voicing  a  fresh  and  fiery  sentiment 
as  wide-spread  as  the  Union  itself. 

Henry's  own  position  on  independence  was  peculiar. 
Remembering  his  prophetic  utterance  about  it  at  Colonel 
Overton's  two  years  before,  we  have  his  personal,  but 
not  his  public,  opinion.  At  heart  he  was  like  Samuel 
Adams,  and  like  John;  but,  unlike  John  Adams,  he 
was  guarded  in  his  expressions.  "  It  is  questionable," 
writes  Herbert  Friedenwald,  in  his  "  Declaration  of 
Independence,"  "  whether  such  avowed  radicals  as  John 
and  Samuel  Adams,  Jefferson  and  Patrick  Henry,  would 
have  advocated  independence  in  earnest  at  this  time 
(1774),  nad  the  opportunity  been  favorable.  To  speak 
loosely,  as  they  did,  to  the  effect  that  if  matters  did  not 
take  a  turn  for  the  better,  independence  was  the  inevit 
able  outcome,  was  far  different  from  establishing  a 
definite,  concerted  plan  having  that  aim  in  view.  They 
were  too  skilled  as  politicians  to  be  the  upholders  of 
a  policy  that  would  have  damned  at  the  outset  the 
cause  into  which  they  had  thrown  themselves  body  and 
soul."  Time  must  pass,  and  changes  must  come;  and 

251 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

time  did  pass.  Two  years  later,  speaking  of  "  inveterate 
prejudices  and  long-established  systems,"  John  Win- 
throp  said :  "  Perhaps  it  may  be  best  to  accomplish  this 
great  affair  [independence]  by  slow  and  almost  imper 
ceptible  steps,  and  not,  per  saltum,  by  one  violent  exer 
tion."  So  Henry  thought ;  and  in  no  other  matter  con 
nected  with  the  progress  of  the  Revolution  was  he  so 
downright  Fabian.  Indeed,  he  seems  to  have  permitted 
himself  to  get  into  one  of  those  reflux  currents  common 
to  strategic  thinkers.  Is  it  allowable  to  say  that  near 
him  at  this  time,  also  rowing  with  too  nice  a  stroke, 
was  John  Dickinson,  who  wished  "  things  to  be  delib 
erately  rendered  firm  at  home  and  favorable  abroad  " 
before  a  declaration  should  be  made?  In  Dickinson's 
view,  the  erection  of  an  independent  republic  would  be 
a  phenomenon  in  the  world ;  "  its  effects  would  be 
immense,  and  might  vibrate  round  the  globe."  Why 
not  at  least  wait  until  France  should  express  herself? 
An  agent  had  been  sent  to  Versailles  to  sound  his  Most 
Christian  Majesty  on  the  subject.  Would  it  not  be  dis 
courteous  to  precipitate  action  before  his  answer  should 
come?  Dickinson's  opposite  in  character,  General 
Charles  Lee,  who  affected  to  love  dogs  because  they 
were  faithful  and  despise  men  because  they  were  not, 
wrote  from  Williamsburg  to  Richard  Henry  Lee : 

"  Pendleton  is  certainly  naturally  a  man  of  sense,  but  I  can 
assure  you  that  the  other  night,  in  a  conversation  I  had  with 
him  on  the  subject  of  independence,  he  talked  or  rather  stam- 
mer'd  nonsense  that  would  have  disgraced  the  lips  of  an  old 
midwife  drunk  with  bohea  tea  and  gin.  .  .  .  For  God's 
sake,  why  do  you  daudle  in  the  Congress  so  strangely — why  do 
you  not  at  once  declare  yourselves  a  separate  independent 
State?  ...  I  wish  you  wou'd  kuff  Doctor  Rush  for  not 
writing." 

General  Lee  called  on  Patrick  Henry,  and  next  day 
wrote  to  him: 

253 


AS  A  CONSTRUCTIVE  STATESMAN 

"The  objection  you  made  yesterday,  if  I  understood  you 
rightly,  to  an  immediate  declaration,  was,  by  many  degrees, 
the  most  specious — indeed,  it  is  the  only  tolerable  one — I  have 
yet  heard.  You  say,  and  with  great  justice,  that  we  ought  pre 
viously  to  have  felt  the  pulse  of  France  and  Spain.  .  .  . 
Your  idea  that  they  [the  French]  may  be  diverted  from  a  line 
of  policy  which  assures  them  such  immense  and  permanent 
advantages  by  an  offer  of  partition  from  Great  Britain,  appears 
to  me,  if  you  will  excuse  the  phrase,  an  absolute  chimera." 

Possibly  this  "  chimera  "  had  been  put  into  Henry's 
head  by  Richard  Henry  Lee.  The  two  friends  fre 
quently  unbosomed  themselves  to  each  other,  and  their 
letters  were  rilled  with  patriotic  confidences.  Of  the 
pending  Convention,  R.  H.  Lee  wrote :  "  Ages  yet 
unborn,  and  millions  existing  at  present,  must  rue  or 
bless  that  Assembly,  on  which  their  happiness  or  misery 
will  so  eminently  depend."  He  wished  Virginia  to  take 
the  lead,  rouse  America,  and  set  up  a  model  government. 
America  should  first  declare  independence,  and  then 
seek  alliances.  Otherwise  European  nations  would  not 
budge.  "  Honor,  dignity,  and  the  customs  of  states 
forbid  them  until  we  take  rank  as  an  independent 
people."  Henry  replied :  "  Your  sentiments  as  to  the 
necessary  progress  of  this  great  affair  correspond  with 
mine.  For  may  not  France  ...  be  allured  by 
the  partition  you  mention?  To  anticipate,  therefore, 
the  efforts  of  the  enemy  by  sending  instantly  American 
Ambassadors  to  France  seems  to  me  absolutely  neces 
sary.  .  .  .  But  is  not  a  confederacy  of  our  States 
previously  necessary  ?  "  In  a  letter  to  John  Adams. 
Henry  said: 

"  Excuse  me  for  telling  you  of  what  I  think  of  immense 
importance ;  'tis  to  anticipate  the  enemy  at  the  French  Court. 
The  half  of  our  Continent  offered  to  France  may  induce  her 
to  aid  our  destruction,  which  she  certainly  has  the  power  to 
accomplish.  I  know  the  free  trade  with  all  the  States  would 
be  more  beneficial  to  her  than  any  territorial  possessions  she 

253 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

might  acquire.  But  pressed,  allured,  as  she  will  be — but,  above 
all,  ignorant  of  the  great  things  we  mean  to  offer,  may  we  not 
lose  her?  The  consequence  is  dreadful.  Excuse  me  again. 
The  Confederacy !  That  must  precede  an  open  declaration  of 
independency  and  foreign  alliances.  Would  it  not  be  sufficient 
to  confine  it,  for  the  present,  to  the  objects  of  offensive  and 
defensive  nature,  and  a  guaranty  of  the  respective  colonial 
rights  ?  If  a  minute  arrangement  of  things  is  attempted  .  .  . 
you  may  split  and  divide;  certainly  will  delay  the  French 
alliance,  which  with  me  is  everything." 

We  who  at  this  day  read  of  the  anxieties  of  these 
Revolutionary  pilots  are  apt  to  misjudge  them,  smiling 
at  what  seems  to  be  their  supersubtlety — their  needless 
fear.  It  is  1776,  and  we  wonder  why  so  much  pother 
should  be  made  over  independence,  which,  in  our  minds, 
was  a  foregone  conclusion  as  long  ago  as  Lexington. 
But  the  truth  is  that  few  Americans  thought  of  inde 
pendence  until  the  bloodshed  at  and  after  Bunker 
Hill  had  solemnized  them  into  grimness.  Then  it  was 
that  men  of  the  character  of  General  Greene  realized 
that  the  States  must  declare  themselves  free,  "  and  call 
upon  the  world,  and  the  great  God  who  governs  it,  to 
witness  the  necessity,  propriety,  and  rectitude  thereof." 
But  even  Bunker  Hill  was  insufficient  to  obliterate  the 
idea  that  America  would  ultimately  return  to  British 
allegiance.  Even  the  "Act  declaring  the  Colonists  out 
of  the  King's  protection  " — which  John  Adams  wittily 
called  a  British  Declaration  of  American  Independence 
— was  insufficient.  It  was  a  sudden  and  unpreconcerted 
conflux  of  events  that  intensified  the  issue,  making  it 
paramount  in  the  public  mind.  With  the  New  Year, 
Washington  unfurled  the  Union  flag.  On  the  7th  of 
January,  Congress  heard  of  the  King's  war  speech  and 
the  threat  to  use  Hessian  troops ;  on  the  8th,  it  learned 
of  the  arrival  of  British  reinforcements  and  of  the 
burning  of  Norfolk;  on  the  loth,  it  became  aware  of 
the  presence  in  the  city  of  something  as  noiseless  in  its 

254 


AS  A  CONSTRUCTIVE  STATESMAN 

approach  as  the  snow-flakes  that  fell  around  Inde 
pendence  Hall.  This  was  Thomas  Paine's  pamphlet, 
"  Common  Sense."  "  In  the  course  of  this  winter," 
writes  John  Adams,  "  appeared  a  phenomenon  in  Phila 
delphia,  a  disastrous  meteor;  I  mean  Thomas  Paine." 
Then  Adams  ungenerously  proceeds  to  belittle  Paine ; 
but  whatever  Paine's  personality,  it  is  a  simple  truth 
that  his  "  Common  Sense  "  quickened  the  mind  of  the 
people  throughout  America  and  helped  more  than  any 
thing  else  to  bring  on  the  Declaration.  The  man  for 
whom  General  Lee  bespoke  a  "  kuff,"  Dr.  Benjamin 
Rush,  says  of  Paine :  "  He  wrote  his  '  Common  Sense  ' 
at  my  request.  .  .  .  He  read  the  sheets  to  me  at  my 
house  as  he  composed  them.  .  .  .  Mr.  Paine  pro 
posed  to  call  it  '  Plain  Truth.'  I  objected  to  it,  and  sug 
gested  the  title  of  '  Common  Sense/  .  .  .  The 
author  and  the  printer  (Robert  Bell)  were  immediately 
brought  together,  and  '  Common  Sense '  burst  from  the 
press  of  the  latter  in  a  few  days,  with  an  effect  which 
has  rarely  been  produced  by  types  and  paper  in  any  age 
or  country."  Turning  the  pages  of  John  H.  Hazleton's 
"  Declaration  of  Independence,"  one  sees  multitudes  of 
allusions  to  it  in  letters  of  the  time.  Recalling  a  patri 
otic  pun  of  '76,  it  began  to  be  popular  to  have  "  a  Paine 
in  the  head."  Most  people  accepted  the  final  sentence 
in  "  Common  Sense  "  as  their  own  conclusion :  "  Until 
an  independence  is  declared,  the  Continent  will  feel 
itself  like  a  man  who  continues  putting  off  some  unpleas 
ant  business  from  day  to  day,  yet  knows  it  must  be 
done,  hates  to  set  about  it,  and  is  continually  haunted 
with  the  thoughts  of  its  necessity." 

If  Henry  were  marking  time  for  caution's  sake,  he 
might  now  step  forward.  The  people  were  coming  up 
abreast  of  him.  If  he  had  slipped  into  a  state  of  dubi- 
tation  while  pondering  over  the  logical  order  of  events 
— union,  alliance,  avowal  of  nationality — it  was  time 

255 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

for  him  to  make  light  of  these  things,  to  regain  his 
swing,  his  daring,  his  spirit  of  leadership. 

The  fifth,  the  final,  and  by  all  odds  the  most  famous 
Virginia  Convention  met  in  the  Hall  of  the  House  of 
Burgesses  at  Williamsburg  on  the  6th  of  May.  The 
Capitol  was  crowded.  Looking  down  from  the  gallery, 
the  fair  patriots  who  packed  it  saw  one  hundred  and 
twenty-eight  representative  men — the  pick  of  all  the 
counties.  As  a  rule,  they  were  tall  men;  but  one  who 
would  appear  in  a  few  days  was  called  "  the  great  little 
Mr.  Madison."  Do  the  older  gladiators  glance  at  the 
striplings  when  they  enter  the  arena?  If  so,  Henry's 
prescience  must  have  made  him  look  hard  at  this  young 
man  of  twenty-five.  By  the  same  token,  he  should  have 
looked  at  another — Edmund  Randolph,  twenty-three, 
six  feet  tall,  "  the  most  promising  scion  of  a  stock  which 
had  been  from  time  immemorial  foremost  in  the  colony." 
A  few  of  the  men  were  clad  in  velvet,  with  powdered 
wigs ;  but  homespun  and  buckskin  were  the  rule.  John 
Esten  Cooke,  writing  of  this  same  assembly,  says  that 
Henry  "  wore  buckskin  short  clothes,  yarn  stockings, 
and  a  wig  without  powder."  Some  of  the  delegates, 
as  Grigsby  notes,  clung  to  the  cocked  hat;  some  held 
hunting  caps  in  their  hands ;  others  more  airily  twirled 
their  London  conicals.  Madison  was  left  bareheaded 
by  the  theft  of  his  conical  hat  from  the  hall  of  a  Wil 
liamsburg  house  where  he  was  visiting,  and  knew  not 
where  to  get  another.  Swords  were  out  of  fashion,  but 
it  was  war-time  and  many  of  the  delegates  from  the 
upper  counties  were  armed. 

In  looking  down  from  the  gallery,  it  was  seen  that  no 
one  sat  in  the  red-curtained  chair  on  the  dais.  Peyton 
Randolph,  its  customary  occupant,  was  dead.  Colonel 
Richard  Bland,  almost  blind  from  age  and  much  study, 
realized  that  the  seat  needed  to  be  filled ;  so,  rising,  he 
nominated  his  friend  Pendleton.  Archibald  Cary, 

256 


AS  A  CONSTRUCTIVE  STATESMAN 

another  supporter  of  Pendleton  as  against  Henry, 
seconded  the  nomination.  Now,  Henry  had  decided  to 
let  by-gones  be  by-gones;  and  he  had  determined  not 
to  antagonize  Pendleton,  seeing  that  the  work  of  the 
Convention  was  to  be  constructive,  and  that  unity  of 
action  was  a  prerequisite  to  success.  To  him  the  Com 
mittee  of  Safety  was  a  failure.  Better  government  was 
needed.  But  he  could  not  control  certain  spirits  in  the 
Convention.  "  Up  to  this  moment,"  says  Grigsby, 
"  although  much  dissatisfaction  with  the  conduct  of  the 
Committee  of  Safety  had  been  expressed  privately  and 
in  print,  it  was  not  certainly  known  that  there  would 
be  a  formal  contest  for  the  chair.  But  all  doubt  was 
instantly  dispelled  when  Johnson  of  Louisa  appeared 
on  the  floor.  The  county  from  which  he  came,  the 
very  name  which  he  bore,  settled  the  question.  It  was 
the  county  of  Louisa  which  Henry  represented  when 
he  offered  his  resolutions  against  the  Stamp  Act. 
.  .  .  Of  all  the  opponents  of  the  party  of  Pendleton 
for  the  past  ten  years,  the  Johnsons  were  the  most  ardent 
and  uncompromising.  They  were  men  of  fierce  tem 
perament,  and  were  utterly  fearless  in  the  expression 
of  their  opinions.  As  a  friend  of  Henry,  Thomas 
Johnson  felt  acutely  the  indignity  with  which  it  was 
urged  he  had  been  treated  by  the  Committee  of  Safety, 
and  he  was  unwilling  that  Pendleton,  whom  he  held 
bound  for  the  action  of  the  Committee,  and  who  was 
then  at  its  head,  should  so  soon  receive  so  signal  a 
mark  of  public  favor.  He  proposed  Thomas  Ludwell 
Lee  for  the  chair,  and  was  sustained  by  Bartholomew 
Dandridge.  But  here,  as  throughout  a  life  protracted 
far  beyond  the  limit  of  the  Psalmist,  and  spent  to  its 
latest  hour  in  the  public  service,  the  fortunate  star  of 
Pendleton  prevailed.  He  was  reflected."  Grigsby 
further  notes  "  the  scrupulous  care  "  with  which  Pen 
dleton,  in  his  address  of  thanks,  "  kept  out  of  sight 
17  257 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

the  subject  of  independence,  which  he  well  knew  the 
party  of  Henry  intended  to  bring  forward." 

"  The  party  of  Henry  "  was  never  better  led  than 
now.  It  cooperated  with  Pendleton  in  all  pressing  mat 
ters,  and  did  not  raise  it's  voice  for  independence  until 
the  I4th  of  May,  when  the  delegates  were  free  to  give 
the  measure  their  full  and  solemn  consideration.  Then, 
in  Committee  of  the  Whole,  at  Henry's  request,  Gen 
eral  Thomas  'Nelson  introduced  some  "  rough  resolu 
tions  "  (still  preserved,  in  Henry's  handwriting)  en 
joining  the  Virginia  delegates  in  Congress  "  to  procure 
an  immediate,  clear,  and  full  Declaration  of  Indepen 
dency."  The  preamble  gave  the  reasons.  Two  other 
sets  of  resolutions  were  offered,  each  declaring  Vir 
ginia  independent,  but  omitting  any  reference  to  Con 
gress.  Finally,  during  the  debate,  which  lasted  two 
days,  Pendleton  put  together  a  set  of  fresh  resolves, 
and  on  the  I5th  these  were  adopted  without  dissent. 
The  Virginia  delegates  in  Congress  were  "  instructed 
to  propose  to  that  respectable  body  to  declare  the  United 
Colonies  free  and  independent  States."  Under  the  same 
resolves,  a  committee  was  appointed  to  prepare  a 
Declaration  of  Rights  and  frame  a  government  for 
Virginia.  Young  Randolph,  who  must  have  followed 
the  proceedings  with  the  keenest  interest,  says : 

"  When  the  disposition  of  the  peoples  as  exhibited  by  their 
representatives  could  not  be  mistaken,  Henry  had  the  full 
indulgence  of  his  own  private  judgment,  and  he  concerted  with 
Nelson  that  he  (Nelson)  should  introduce  the  question  of 
independence,  and  that  he  (Henry)  should  enforce  it.  Nelson 
affected  nothing  of  oratory,  except  what  ardent  feelings  might 
inspire,  and,  characteristic  of  himself,  he  had  no  fears  of  his 
own  with  which  to  temporize,  and  supposing  that  others  ought 
to  have  none,  he  passed  over  the  probabilities  of  foreign  aid, 
stepped  lightly  on  the  difficulties  of  procuring  military  stores 
and  the  inexperience  of  officers  and  soldiers,  but  pressed  a 
Declaration  of  Independence  upon  what  with  him  were  incon- 

258 


AS  A  CONSTRUCTIVE  STATESMAN 

trovertible  grounds;  that  we  were  oppressed,  had  humbly 
supplicated  a  redress  of  grievances  which  had  been  refused 
with  insult,  and  that  to  return  from  battle  against  the  sovereign 
with  the  cordiality  of  subjects  was  absurd.  It  was  expected 
that  a  Declaration  of  Independence  would  certainly  be  passed, 
and  for  obvious  reasons  Mr.  Henry  seemed  allotted  to  crown 
his  political  conduct  with  this  supreme  stroke.  And  yet  for  a 
considerable  time  he  talked  of  the  subject  as  critical,  but 
without  committing  himself  to  a  pointed  avowal  in  its  favor 
or  a  pointed  repudiation  of  it.  He  thought  that  a  course  which 
put  at  stake  the  lives  and  fortunes  of  the  people  should  appear 
to  be  their  own  act,  and  that  he  ought  not  to  place  upon 
the  responsibility  of  his  own  eloquence  a  revolution  of  which 
the  people  might  be  wearied  after  the  present  stimulus  should 
cease  to  operate.  But  after  some  time  he  appeared  in  an 
element  for  which  he  was  born.  To  cut  the  knot  which  calm 
prudence  was  puzzled  to  untie  was  worthy  of  the  magnificence 
of  his  genius.  He  entered  into  no  subtlety  of  reasoning,  but 
was  aroused  by  the  now  apparent  spirit  of  the  people.  As  a 
pillar  of  fire,  which  notwithstanding  the  darkness  of  the  pros 
pect  would  conduct  to  the  promised  land,  he  inflamed  and 
was  followed  by  the  Convention.  .  .  .  His  eloquence  un 
locked  the  secret  springs  of  the  human  heart,  robbed  danger  of 
all  its  terror,  and  broke  the  keystone  in  the  arch  of  royal 
power." 

Cooke,  writing  of  the  Convention,  says :  "  It  is  cer 
tain  that  he  [Henry]  swayed  every  assembly  that  he 
addressed,  apparently  at  his  pleasure.  Whenever  he 
was  fully  aroused,  he  overthrew  all  opposition,  and 
forced  his  listeners  as  from  a  species  of  magnetism  to 
accept  his  views  as  the  only  true  ones.  .  .  .  His 
wonderful  oratory  made  him  a  thousand  times  the 
superior  "  of  the  old  nabobs.  "  By  common  consent 
of  all  his  contemporaries,  his  eloquence  was  indescrib 
able."  It  would  be  interesting  to  know  just  what  hap 
pened  in  Henry's  mind  when  he  leaped  from  cold  to 
hot  in  this  great  address  in  the  Independence  Con 
vention.  Had  he  a  struggle  with  himself?  Did  he 
wish  to  so  manage  the  great  colonial  procedure  as  to 
win  France  and  bind  the  confederacy  tighter  before 

259 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

declaring  for  American  sovereignty?  Did  he  suddenly 
sweep  this  from  him  in  the  heat  generated  by  his  own 
thoughts,  and  see  that  the  thing  to  do  was  to  go  the 
full  length  then  and  there?  Or  was  he  acting?  Did 
he  purposely  beat  about  the  bush  at  the  beginning  in 
order  that  when  he  struck  his  game,  his  cry  might 
startle,  stir,  and  awaken  responsive  shouts?  He  was  a 
great  hunter.  He  was  a  great  actor.  But  he  was  also 
an  exceedingly  considerate,  modest,  and  deferential 
man  among  men.  Therefore  it  is  impossible  to  point 
precisely  to  his  springs  of  action  in  this  instance.  We 
know  that  General  Nelson,  with  the  resolves  in  his 
pocket,  made  off  for  Philadelphia;  that  General  Wash 
ington,  who  happened  to  be  there,  was  much  gratified ; 
that  Richard  Henry  Lee  moved  in  Congress  "  that  these 
United  Colonies  are,  and  of  right  ought  to  be,  free  and 
independent  States  " ;  that  Thomas  Jefferson  wrote  a 
Declaration  in  every  way  worthy  of  the  theme,  and  that 
Congress  put  upon  it  the  seal  of  its  approval.  It  may 
be  that  for  purposes  of  policy  New  England  waited 
for  Virginia  to  lead  in  the  matter  of  independence,  and 
it  is  a  fact  that  North  Carolina,  whence  arose  the  mooted 
Mecklenburg  Declaration,  was  a  month  ahead  of  Vir 
ginia  in  authorizing  her  delegates  to  "  concur "  with 
other  delegates ;  but  Henry's  State  was  the  first  to  face 
and  force  the  issue. 

Now  at  last  the  British  flag  was  hauled  down  from 
above  the  Capitol  in  Williamsburg,  and  the  Union  flag 
took  its  place.  The  troops  paraded  before  General 
Lewis,  who  was  soon  to  crush  Dunmore,  and  then  soon 
to  die  of  the  same  malarial  fever  we  have  mentioned. 
Artillery  boomed;  toasts  were  drunk;  and  at  night  the 
city  was  illuminated. 

Such  was  the  first  achievement  of  the  great  Conven 
tion.  Its  out-turn  thereafter  was  to  be  still  more  notable. 
Its  committees  met  at  seven  in  the  morning ;  the  Conven- 

260 


AS  A  CONSTRUCTIVE  STATESMAN 

tion  itself  at  nine,  adjourning  at  five  in  the  afternoon. 
Much  night-work  was  done.  Grigsby  credits  Henry  with 
important  service  in  this  particular.  He  says :  "  Nor 
was  the  influence  of  Henry,  as  has  been  too  generally 
believed,  confined  to  public  debate.  He  was  as  effective 
in  the  committee-room  as  on  the  floor  of  the  house.  In 
both  spheres  his  honesty  and  intrepidity  were  the  sources 
of  his  success.  Everybody  saw  that  he  was  sincere,  and 
that  he  did  not  belong  to  a  class  not  uncommon  in  revo 
lutions  who  are  disposed  to  cling  to  the  powers  that 
be  with  one  hand,  and  to  the  people  with  the  other. 
There  was  something  fascinating  in  the  boldness  with 
which  he  planted  himself  on  the  extreme  frontier  of 
public  rights."  In  view  of  such  testimony,  is  Gaillard 
Hunt  justified  in  saying,  as  he  does  in  his  "Life  of 
Madison  " :  "  The  Convention  was  a  body  with  con 
structive  work  before  it,  and  Henry's  genius  lay  not  in 
that  direction.  The  power  he  exerted  in  the  proceedings 
of  the  Convention  was  not  as  great  as  that  which 
had  swept  along  with  him  before  or  which  he  exercised 
afterwards  upon  successive  Legislatures  of  the  State  "  ? 
This  seems  to  us  to  be  in  line  with  the  Jeffersonian  idea 
of  Henry  rather  than  a  conclusion  tallying  with  the 
truth.  Many  facts  are  to  be  considered. 

It  was  decided  by  the  delegates  that  if  the  Convention 
had  the  power  to  declare  independence — "the  highest 
act  of  sovereignty  " — it  could  also  organize  a  permanent 
government.  Hence  some  thirty  committeemen,  of 
whom  Henry  was  one,  set  about  the  task  of  drafting  a 
Bill  of  Rights  and  of  framing  a  written  Constitution. 
Thomas  Ludwell  Lee's  idea  that  Congress  should  sug 
gest  a  uniform  model,  to  be  adopted  by  all  the  States, 
found  slight  favor.  There  was  a  feeling  abroad  that 
Virginia  herself  could  best  originate  a  plan  and  pattern. 
The  experiment  was  new  in  the  world  and  of  vast  import 
to  all  mankind.  Several  of  the  delegates  at  Philadel- 


261 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

phia  were  deeply  interested  in  the  undertaking.  Richard 
Henry  Lee  and  George  Wythe  talked  with  John  Adams 
about  it;  whereupon  Adams  wrote  a  pamphlet, 
"  Thoughts  on  Government,"  which  was  printed  and 
sent  to  Henry.  Lee  also  formulated  a  plan  for  Henry, 
who  caused  "  A  Government  Scheme  "  to  be  printed  in 
Purdie's  Gazette  at  Williamsburg — whether  his  own 
or  Lee's  is  uncertain,  since  no  copy  now  exists.  But 
another  plan  of  government  came  down  from  Philadel 
phia — the  Carter  Braxton  plan.  Meantime,  Meriwether 
Smith  offered  a  skeleton  scheme;  and  finally,  on  the 
eve  of  adjournment,  Wythe  appeared,  bearing  upon  his 
travel-stained  person  a  "  bill  "  from  the  pen  of  Thomas 
Jefferson. 

For  at  least  five  days  following  the  adoption  of  the 
Independence  resolves  Henry  probably  had  a  heightened 
sense  of  his  responsibility  as  a  republican  leader.  He 
was  the  acknowledged  antagonist  of  the  aristocratic 
party,  and  it  was  his  business  to  see  that  no  aristocratic 
ideas  should  find  place  upon  the  protocol.  That  he  had 
reason  to  be  watchful  is  shown  by  a  glance  at  the  Carter 
Braxton  project,  which  sketched  out  a  little  kingdom, 
to  be  a  pattern  for  other  little  kingdoms  on  these  Colum 
bian  shores.  There  was  to  be  a  Lower  House,  elected 
for  three  years;  an  Upper  House  of  twenty-four  life 
Senators ;  and  a  Governor  elected  for  life.  His  Excel 
lency  was  to  be  a  creator  of  judges  and  other  officials. 
In  contrast  with  this  was  the  Adams  plan:  a  House 
elected  by  the  people  every  year;  a  Senate  elected  by 
the  House  for  one  year ;  and  a  Governor  elected  annually 
on  joint  ballot.  The  Senate  was  to  have  "a  negative 
on  the  Lower  House,"  and  the  Governor  a  veto  on  both. 
Judges  were  to  be  chosen  by  the  Legislature.  Let  us 
see  how  Henry  felt  on  Monday,  the  2Oth  of  May,  when 
he  sent  two  letters  North — one  to  Richard  Henry  Lee, 
the  other  to  John  Adams.  In  the  Lee  letter,  he  says : 

262 


AS  A  CONSTRUCTIVE  STATESMAN 

"The  grand  work  of  forming  a  Constitution  for  Virginia 
is  now  before  the  Convention,  where  your  love  of  equal  liberty 
and  your  skill  in  public  counsels  might  so  eminently  serve  the 
cause  of  your  country.  Perhaps  I  am  mistaken,  but  I  fear 
too  great  a  bias  to  Aristocracy  prevails  among  the  opulent. 
I  own  myself  a  Democrat  on  the  plan  of  our  admired  friend, 
J.  Adams,  whose  pamphlet  I  read  with  great  pleasure.  A  per 
formance  from  Philadelphia  is  just  come  here,  ushered  in,  I'm 

told,  by  a  colleague  of  yours,  B ,  and  greatly  recommended 

by  him.  I  don't  like  it.  Is  the  author  a  Whig? — one  or  two 
expressions  in  the  book  make  me  ask.  I  wish  to  divide  you 
and  have  you  here,  to  animate  by  your  manly  eloquence  the 
sometimes  drooping  spirits  of  our  country,  and  in  Congress, 
to  be  the  ornament  of  your  native  country  and  the  vigilant, 
determined  foe  of  Tyranny.  To  give  you  colleagues  of  kindred 
sentiments  is  my  wish.  I  doubt  you  have  them  not  at  present. 
.  .  .  Vigor,  animation,  and  all  the  powers  of  mind  and  body 
must  now  be  summoned  and  collected  together  in  one  grand 
effort.  Moderation,  falsely  so  called,  hath  nearly  brought  on 
us  final  ruin.  And  to  see  those  who  have  so  fatally  advised  us 
still  guiding,  or  at  least  sharing,  our  public  counsels  alarms 
me." 

In  his  letter  to  Adams,  he  speaks  at  once  of  the 
pamphlet : 

"  I  am  exceedingly  obliged  to  you  for  it ;  and  I  am  not  with 
out  hopes  it  may  produce  good  here,  where  there  is  among  most 
of  our  opulent  families  a  strong  bias  to  Aristocracy.  I  tell 
my  friends  you  are  the  author.  Upon  that  supposition  I  have 
two  reasons  for  liking  the  book.  The  sentiments  are  precisely 
the  same  I  have  long  since  taken  up,  and  they  come  recom 
mended  by  you.  Go  on,  my  dear  friend,  to  assail  the  strong 
holds  of  tyranny.  .  .  .  Our  Convention  is  now  employed  in 
the  great  work  of  forming  a  Constitution.  My  most  esteemed 
republican  form  has  many  and  powerful  enemies.  A  silly 
thing,  published  in  Philadelphia,  by  '  A  Native  of  Virginia,' 
has  just  made  its  appearance  here,  strongly  recommended,  'tis 
said,  by  one  of  our  delegates  now  with  you — Braxton.  His 
reasonings  upon  and  distinction  between  private  and  public 
virtue  are  weak,  shallow,  and  evasive,  and  the  whole  perform 
ance  an  affront  and  disgrace  to  this  country;  and,  by  one 
expression,  I  suspect  his  Whiggism. 

"  Our  session  will  be  very  long,  during  which  I  cannot 
263 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

count  upon  one  coadjutor  of  talents  equal  to  the  task.    Would 
to  God  you  and  your  Sam  Adams  were  here ! " 

At  this  point  several  faithful  biographers  of  several 
famous  men  throw  up  their  hands  in  protestation.  How 
could  Henry  write  such  a  thing — the  considerate  and 
unvaunting  Patrick?  In  truth,  it  was  one  of  the  rare 
indiscretions  of  Henry  to  thus  lament  the  lack  of  coad 
jutors;  but,  as  we  have  intimated,  he  was  under  a  strain. 
Besides,  he  had  no  idea  that  young  Madison  would 
prove  a  star  of  the  first  magnitude ;  nor  did  he  suspect 
that  there  was  something  in  the  pocket  of  his  friend 
George  Mason  infinitely  more  precious  than  all  the 
golden  guineas  he  had  ever  jingled  there. 

Mark  well  that  the  letter  was  written  on  Monday, 
and  mark  well  that  Mason  had  not  taken  his  seat  in 
the  Convention  until  the  Saturday  before.  He  had 
developed  no  plan  publicly.  Probably  Henry  had  not 
talked  with  him;  possibly  he  had  not  even  noted  his 
presence  in  the  hall ;  at  any  rate,  it  was  still  to  be  dis 
closed  that  the  "  Planter  Statesman "  was  the  genius 
of  the  hour. 

He  was  a  genius  with  the  gout,  and  it  was  a  fit  of  the 
gout  that  had  kept  him  at  home  so  long.  A  six-footer, 
sinewy,  active,  brown-skinned,  his  black  eyes  "burned 
with  the  brightness  of  youth."  There  was  gray  in  his 
hair,  which  was  as  "  black  as  that  of  Charles  II.,  whom 
his  ancestors  had  sustained  on  the  bloody  field  of  Wor 
cester."  But  our  scion  of  the  cavaliers  was  a  democrat 
after  Henry's  own  heart — "  a  man  of  the  first  order  of 
wisdom  among  those  who  acted  on  the  theatre  of  the 
Revolution,  of  expansive  mind,  profound  judgment, 
cogent  in  argument,  learned  in  the  lore  of  former  con 
stitutions."  The  tribute  is  Jefferson's,  who  tells  us  also 
that  when  he  spoke,  "his  language  was  strong,  his 
manner  most  impressive,  and  strengthened  by  a  dash  of 

264 


AS  A  CONSTRUCTIVE  STATESMAN 

biting  cynicism,  when  provocation  made  it  seasonable." 
When  he  grew  old,  an  opponent  said  of  him  that  "  Col 
onel  Mason's  mind  was  failing  him  from  age."  "  When 
his  mind  fails  him,"  commented  Mason,  "  no  one  will 
ever  discover  it." 

"  We  are  now  going  upon  the  most  important  of  all 
subjects — government !  "  wrote  Mason,  the  day  after 
his  arrival  at  Williamsburg,  addressing  Richard  Henry 
Lee.  :'  The  committee  appointed  to  prepare  a  plan  is, 
according  to  custom,  overcharged  with  useless  members. 
You  know  our  Convention.  I  need  not  say  that  it  is 
not  mended  by  the  recent  elections.  We  shall  in  all 
probability  have  a  thousand  ridiculous  and  impracti 
cable  proposals,  and  of  course  a  plan  formed  of  hetero 
geneous,  jarring,  and  unintelligible  ingredients.  This 
can  be  prevented  only  by  a  few  men  of  integrity  and 
ability,  whose  country's  interest  lies  next  their  hearts, 
undertaking  this  business  and  defending  it  ably  through 
every  stage  of  opposition." 

There  is  no  doubt  whatever  that  the  course  thus  out 
lined  was  the  one  actually  pursued.  Mason  and  Henry 
stood  together.  The  first  debate  was  over  the  Declara 
tion  of  Rights — "  the  basis  and  foundation  "  of  the 
government.  William  Wirt  Henry  surmises  that 
"  Colonel  Mason's  draft  was  brought  forward  after 
others  had  been  presented,"  and  that  "  it  embodied  their 
best  features."  Miss  Kate  Mason  Rowland,  in  her 
"  Life  of  George  Mason,"  says  that  Mason  took  with 
him  from  "  Gunston  Hall  "  to  Williamsburg  a  draft  of 
the  bill  subsequently  proposed  by  him.  An  original 
of  a  tentative  draft,  mainly  in  the  handwriting  of  Mason 
but  partly  in  that  of  Thomas  Ludwell  Lee,  is  in  the 
possession  of  the  State  of  Virginia,  together  with  a  copy 
of  the  bill  as  adopted,  this  latter  being  wholly  in  Mason's 
hand  and  endorsed  by  him  as  follows :  "  This  Declara 
tion  of  Rights  was  the  first  in  America ;  it  received  few 

265 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

alterations  or  additions  in  the  Virginia  Convention 
(some  of  them  not  for  the  better),  and  was  afterwards 
closely  imitated  by  the  other  United  States."  In  a  letter 
to  his  cousin,  Colonel  George  Mercer,  Mason  subse 
quently  wrote :  "  I  enclose  you  a  copy  of  the  Declara 
tion  of  Rights  just  as  it  was  drawn  and  presented  by 
me  to  the  Virginia  Convention,  where  it  received  few 
alterations,  some  of  them  I  think  not  for  the  better." 
But  the  authorship  of  two  of  the  sixteen  articles  in 
the  Bill  of  Rights  has  been  attributed  to  Henry.  Hence 
a  controversy  has  arisen.  Miss  Rowland  avers  that  "  a 
denial  of  them  to  Mason  would  invalidate  equally  his 
authorship  of  the  remaining  articles.  And  it  is  signifi 
cant,"  she  adds,  "  that  the  claim  made  in  this  connec 
tion  for  Patrick  Henry  is  based  solely  on  a  misleading 
reminiscence  of  the  same  historian  [Edmund  Randolph], 
who  elsewhere  declares  that  while  '  many  projects  of  a 
Bill  of  Rights  and  Constitution '  were  brought  forward, 
'  that  proposed  by  George  Mason  swallowed  up  all  the 
rest,  by  fixing  the  grounds  and  plan '  of  the  two  papers 
subsequently  adopted."  What  Randolph  wrote  was: 
"  That  proposed  by  George  Mason  swallowed  up  all  the 
rest,  by  fixing  the  grounds  and  plan  which  after  great 
discussion  and  correction  were  finally  ratified."  There 
was  great  discussion  and  there  was  correction.  Mason 
himself  did  not  think  much  of  the  changes  made  in  his 
bill ;  but  that  they  were  made  he  testifies  frankly.  Why 
Miss  Rowland  should  speak  of  a  "  misleading  reminis 
cence  "  is  not  clear.  Randolph  saw  with  his  own  eyes 
and  heard  with  his  own  ears  the  whole  proceeding,  from 
the  moment  the  business  began  until  it  ended,  on  the 
1 2th  of  June,  when  the  bill  was  adopted.  He  noted  the 
attack  of  the  aristocrats  on  the  declaration  in  the  first 
article  that  "  all  men  are  by  nature  equally  free  and 
independent " ;  and  when  we  recall  that  he  had  almost 
broken  his  own  heart  in  severing  himself  from  his  Tory 

266 


AS  A  CONSTRUCTIVE  STATESMAN 

father,  we  can  realize  with  what  zest  and  fascination 
he  must  have  watched  the  progress  of  the  bill  as  it 
passed,  section  by  section,  through  the  ordeal  to  which 
it  was  subjected.  He  says :  "  The  fifteenth,  recom 
mending  an  adherence  and  frequent  recurrence  to 
fundamental  principles,  and  the  sixteenth,  unfettering 
the  exercise  of  religion,  were  proposed  by  Mr.  Henry. 
The  latter,  coming  from  a  gentleman  who  was  supposed 
to  be  a  dissenter,  caused  an  appeal  to  him,  whether  it 
was  designed  as  a  prelude  to  an  attack  on  the  estab 
lished  church,  and  he  disclaimed  such  an  object."  The 
article  secured  religious  liberty  to  all  people,  "  unless 
under  the  color  of  religion  any  man  disturb  the  peace." 
Madison  took  out  the  word  "  toleration,"  and  otherwise 
verbally  improved  the  article,  but  the  sense  remained 
practically  the  same.  To  Henry,  therefore,  great  credit 
goes.  "  To  him,"  as  William  Wirt  Henry  declares, 
"  we  are  indebted  for  the  article  in  the  Virginia  Bill  of 
Rights  securing  Religious  Liberty,  and  for  the  first 
Amendment  to  the  Federal  Constitution  embodying  the 
same  principle.  .  .  .  He  seemed,  as  it  were  by  intu 
ition,  to  know  when  the  popular  mind  was  ready  for 
every  political  movement,  and  he  never  made  a  mistake 
as  to  the  proper  time  to  take  a  step  in  advance.  The 
adoption  of  this  principle  as  the  chief  corner-stone  of 
American  government,  and  its  subsequent  progress  in 
other  portions  of  the  world,  indicating  that  it  is  destined 
to  become  all-prevailing  as  Christian  civilization  ad 
vances,  with  the  inestimable  blessings  which  flow  from 
it,  make  Mr.  Henry's  act  in  causing  its  insertion  in  the 
Virginia  Bill  of  Rights  the  most  important  of  his  life. 
If  it  had  been  the  only  act  of  his  public  life,  it  was 
sufficient  to  have  enrolled  his  name  among  the  greatest 
benefactors  of  the  race." 

The  same  writer  points  out  that  in  drafting  the  Con 
stitution — "  the  first  written  Constitution  of  a  free  state 

267 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

in  the  annals  of  the  world  " — Mason  was  considerably 
influenced  by  the  Adams  plan  as  championed  by  Henry. 
The  struggle  over  the  ordinance  of  government  lasted 
from  the  I2th  to  the  28th  of  June.  Randolph  says : 

"  No  member  but  Henry  could,  with  impunity  to  his  popu 
larity,  have  contended  as  strenuously  as  he  did  for  an  executive 
veto  on  the  acts  of  the  two  houses  of  legislation.  Those  who 
knew  him  to  be  indolent  in  literary  investigations  were  aston 
ished  at  the  manner  in  which  he  exhausted  the  topic,  unaided  as 
he  was  believed  to  be  by  any  treatises  on  government  except 
Montesquieu.  Among  other  arguments,  he  averred  that  a 
Governor  would  be  a  mere  phantom,  unable  to  defend  his  office 
from  the  usurpation  of  the  Legislature,  unless  he  could  inter 
pose  a  vehement  impulse  or  ferment  in  that  body,  and  that  he 
would  otherwise  be  ultimately  a  dependent,  instead  of  a  co 
ordinate,  branch  of  power." 

Again  Randolph  gives  us  a  glimpse  of  Henry  at  work : 
"  An  article  prohibiting  bills  of  attainder  was  defeated 
by  Henry,  who,  with  a  terrifying  picture  of  some  tower 
ing  public  offender,  against  whom  ordinary  laws  would 
be  impotent,  saved  that  dread  power  from  being  ex 
pressly  proscribed." 

And  so  the  great  work  progressed  to  its  completion. 
Was  not  Henry  as  apt,  as  ready,  as  zealous  in  con 
structive  effort  as  he  had  been  in  destroying  the  old 
order  of  evil  ?  Not  that  he  is  entitled  to  primacy  in  this 
matter — not  by  any  means ;  but  he  certainly  bore  a 
great  part.  Mason's  fame  is  splendid  enough  without 
the  added  laurel  of  another.  He  does  not  need  a 
monopoly  of  the  glory  attaching  to  an  act  that  marked 
"  a  new  era  in  the  history  of  government."  How  much 
nobler  it  is  to  figure  as  the  chief  man  among  many  men 
of  merit  than  to  seek  to  dwarf  one's  fellows — to  be  the 
be-all  and  the  do-all !  But  Mason  himself  had  no  such 
thought.  "  The  texture  of  his  mind  was  essentially 
republican,"  says  Grigsby.  To  Mason,  government 

268 


AS  A  CONSTRUCTIVE  STATESMAN 

was  "  the  most  important  of  all  subjects."  It  was  an 
enthusiasm  with  him — this  profound  study  of  a  science 
that  had  sweetness  in  it  for  man  if  it  could  be  rid  of 
kingcraft  and  the  thousand  bitternesses  flowing  there 
from.  Speaking  of  the  Bill  of  Rights,  Grigsby  says: 
"  The  critical  eye  can  detect  in  its  sixteen  sections  the 
history  of  England  in  miniature."  And  here,  finally,  is 
the  eloquent  tribute  to  Mason  by  William  Cabell  Rives : 

"  When  we  look  at  the  Declaration  of  Rights  prepared  by 
him,  and  which,  with  a  few  alterations,  was  adopted  by  the 
Convention,  we  shall  find  it  a  condensed,  logical,  and  luminous 
summary  of  the  great  principles  of  freedom  inherited  by  us 
from  our  British  ancestors,  the  extracted  essence  of  Magna 
Charta,  the  Petition  of  Rights,  the  acts  of  the  Long  Parlia 
ment,  and  the  doctrines  of  the  Revolution  of  1688  as  expounded 
by  Locke — distilled  and  concentrated  through  the  alembic  of 
his  own  powerful  and  discriminating  mind.  There  is  nothing 
more  remarkable  in  the  political  annals  of  America  than  this 
paper." 


269 


XIII 

AS  AN  EXECUTIVE FIVE  TIMES  GOVERNOR 

"  THE  egotism  of  human  nature  will  seldom  allow  us 
to  credit  a  man  for  one  excellence  without  detracting 
from  him  in  other  respects ;  if  he  has  genius,  we  imagine 
he  has  not  common  sense;  if  he  is  a  poet,  we  suppose 
that  he  is  not  a  logician/'  So  says  Brougham;  and  in 
this  connection  we  are  reminded  of  the  gratuitous  as 
sumption  on  the  part  of  sundry  writers  that  Henry  must 
have  lacked  executive  as  well  as  military  capacity. 
He  had  not  been  permitted  to  show  what  stuff  he  was 
made  of  when  it  came  to  the  business  of  outwitting 
or  outfighting  the  enemy,  but  in  the  turn  of  events 
he  was  now  given  an  opportunity  to  prove  his  fitness 
for  administering  the  affairs  of  the  new  Commonwealth. 

When  his  friends  brought  him  forward  as  a  candidate 
for  Governor,  Henry  took  the  ground  that  "  the  office 
was  neither  to  be  sought  nor  refused."  He  saw  clearly 
that  the  new  government  would  be  exposed  to  "  number 
less  hazards  and  perils,"  and  that  if  it  should  succeed,  it 
"  must  be  guarded  by  an  affectionate  assiduity  and 
managed  by  great  abilities."  These  are  his  own  words. 
The  Pendleton  men  pushed  the  candidacy  of  Thomas 
Nelson,  and  pushed  it  hard ;  but,  says  Randolph,  "  from 
every  period  of  Henry's  life  something  of  a  democratic 
and  patriotic  cast  was  collected,  so  as  to  accumulate 
a  rate  of  merit  too  strong  for  this  last  expiring  act  of 
aristocracy."  The  vote  stood :  Henry,  60 ;  Nelson,  45  ; 
Page,  i.  Long  afterwards,  in  Judge  Spencer  Roane's 
presence,  Pendleton  "  justified  himself  for  not  offering 
for  the  office  of  Governor  in  1776,  on  the  ground  that 
he  did  not  think  it  became  those  who  pushed  the 

270 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

Revolution  to  get  into  the  first  offices,  and  that  on  that 
ground  he  voted  for  Secretary  Nelson.  On  which," 
adds  Roane,  "  feeling  that  the  remark  was  aimed  at 
Mr.  Henry,  I  replied  that  we  should  have  cut  a  pretty 
figure  if  that  office  had  been  given  to  a  man  who  was 
no  Whig;  as  Mr.  Nelson  was  said  to  have  been." 
There  is  spice  here — a  sarcasm  at  Henry's  expense. 
American  politics  was  cradled  in  dispute. 

Thus  it  was  that  Henry  began  a  long  State  service, 
declining  in  the  course  of  it  to  go  back  to  the  Continental 
Congress.  His  executive  problems  were  numerous  and 
varied.  Democratic  precedents  were  to  be  set.  Tact 
would  be  called  for  in  dealing  with  the  sister  States. 
Henry,  who  knew  that  he  had  enough  to  do,  proceeded 
to  do  it  so  well  that  he  was  reappointed  on  May  30, 
1777,  and  reflected  in  the  spring  of  1778,  retiring  on 
the  first  of  May,  1779,  because  no  Governor  could  suc 
ceed  himself  for  a  fourth  consecutive  term.  But  having 
led  the  Assembly  in  the  interval,  he  was  chosen  Gov 
ernor  once  more  on  November  17,  1784,  and  reflected 
in  1785.  Indeed,  he  was  made  Governor  in  1786,  and 
even  as  late  as  1796,  but  declined  to  serve.  Let  us 
remember  that  during  the  ten  years  when  he  was  either 
the  executive  head  or  the  legislative  leader,  self-govern 
ing  democracy  was  new  to  itself  in  Virginia,  and  that 
some  of  the  horses  were  hard  to  hold. 

Democracy  was  so  new  to  itself  that  it  looked  with 
interest  upon  the  scarlet  cloak  Governor  Henry  wore 
when,  having  taken  the  oath  of  office  on  the  5th  of  July, 
1776,  he  moved  into  the  "  palace "  at  Williamsburg. 
But  his  scarlet  cloak,  black  small-clothes,  and  dressed 
wig  had  a  meaning.  The  wearer,  says  Judge  Roane, 
"  had  been  accused  by  the  big-wigs  of  former  times  as 
being  a  coarse  and  common  man,  and  utterly  destitute 
of  dignity,  and  perhaps  he  wished  to  show  them  that 
they  were  mistaken."  He  must  have  been  pleased  with 

271 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

some  of  the  congratulatory  addresses  and  letters  received 
by  him,  especially  one  from  the  growing  community 
of  Baptists,  and  another  signed  by  all  the  officers  of  the 
First  and  Second  regiments,  save  Colonel  Woodford. 
No  doubt  he  was  amused  by  a  letter  dated  Charleston, 
S.  C,  which  began :  "  I  used  to  regret  not  being  thrown 
into  the  world  in  the  glorious  third  or  fourth  century 
of  the  Romans,  but  I  am  now  thoroughly  reconciled 
to  my  lot."  It  was  from  General  Charles  Lee,  whose 
crowning  woe  was  to  come  on  Monmouth  battlefield, 
but  who  affected  to  be  troubled  now  because  people 
used  such  terms  as  "  his  Excellency  "  or  "  his  Honor  " 
when  they  addressed  a  simple  citizen  in  a  scarlet  cloak, 
with  a  "  palace  "  for  his  dwelling-place.  "  Yes,"  wrote 
Lee,  "  there  is  a  barbarism  crept  in  among  us  that  ex 
tremely  shocks  me.  I  mean  those  tinsel  epithets  with 
which  (I  come  in  for  my  share)  we  are  so  beplastered — 
1  his  excellency/  and  '  his  honor/  '  the  honorable  presi 
dent  of  the  honorable  Congress  '  or  '  the  honorable  Con 
vention/  .  .  .  For  my  part,  I  would  as  lief  they 
would  put  ratsbane  in  my  mouth  as  the  '  excellency  ' 
with  which  I  am  daily  consumed." 

The  "  palace "  where  Henry  dwelt  was  "  lavishly 
ornamented  within  and  without,"  and  had  extensive 
grounds,  gardens,  and  outhouses — among  them  two 
offices.  The  reception-room,  "  running  half  the  front 
and  the  entire  depth  of  the  building,"  was  less  needed 
by  the  democratic  Henry  than  it  had  been  by  the  lordly 
Botetourt,  or  by  John  Murray,  Earl  of  Dunmore.  Pro 
fessor  Tyler  scents  poetic  retribution  in  the  picturesque 
fact  that  the  man  who  led  the  gunpowder  party  now  had 
it  in  his  power  to  write  proclamations  against  Dunmore 
at  the  same  desk  from  which  Dunmore  had  fulminated 
against  "  a  certain  Patrick  Henry,  of  Hanover  County." 
But  Dunmore's  day  was  done.  This  very  month  he 
would  be  slipping  out  between  the  Capes,  never  to  return. 

272 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

On  the  8th  of  July,  General  Andrew  Lewis,  who  had 
crushed  Cornstalk  on  the  border,  put  his  heel  on  the 
remnant  of  Dunmore's  band  at  Gwinn's  Island,  by 
Chesapeake  side;  and  for  three  years  Virginia  was  free 
from  all  save  petty  invaders  who  played  the  pirate  along 
the  river  shores. 

Henry,  with  his  Privy  Council,  of  which  John  Page 
was  President,  went  to  work  with  a  will.  In  attestation 
of  this,  and  of  the  manifold  duties  performed,  are  the 
official  records  still  to  be  seen  in  the  State  Library. 
One  has  but  to  turn  the  pages  of  the  folios  there  to 
satisfy  himself  that  if  Henry  did  not  roll  up  his  sleeves, 
he  at  least  deserved  the  pay  he  got — a  thousand  pounds 
a  year.  His  letter  books  for  '76,  '77,  and  '78  are  not 
to  be  found,  but  the  Executive  Journal,  missing  for  1779, 
is  nearly  complete  for  the  first  three  years  of  his  guber 
natorial  service.  We  cannot  undertake  to  squeeze 
out  of  these  dry  details  the  sweat  that  Henry  and  his 
councillors  put  into  them,  nor  should  we  have  dwelt 
upon  them  at  all  save  for  the  purpose  of  proving  that 
he  could  pin  himself  down  to  irksome  labor.  Note  that 
the  State  had  in  it  400,000  people — half  of  them  white ; 
'that  the  ship  had  to  be  driven  along  with  every  sail 
brand-new,  and  that  the  old  beacons  and  buoys  had  been 
obliterated  by  the  storm  of  war.  As  an  instance  of 
the  onerous  nature  of  the  work:  Many  claims  were 
entered  against  the  State,  and  it  was  incumbent  upon 
Henry  and  his  helpers  not  only  to  pass  upon  the  war 
rants,  but,  for  lack  of  an  auditor,  to  keep  record  of  them. 
There  was  a  salt  famine,  and  there  was  a  scarcity  of 
medicine;  so  a  fleet  of  sloops  had  to  be  sent  off  to  the 
West  Indies  to  obtain  supplies  of  these  necessaries. 
There  was  much  other  public  business  to  be  done;  and 
we  may  be  sure  that  Henry  also  felt  it  to  be  a  part  of 
his  duty  to  watch  the  progress  of  political  events.  It 
has  been  mentioned  that  his  health  broke  in  the  summer 
18  273 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

of  1776.  He  was  at  Williamsburg  when  the  first  repub 
lican  Legislature  met  there  on  the  7th  of  October,  but  on 
the  30th  "  the  Speaker  laid  before  the  House  a  letter 
from  the  Governor,  informing  him  that  the  low  state  of 
his  health  rendered  him  unable  to  attend  to  the  duties 
of  his  office,  and  that  his  physicians  had  recommended 
him  to  retire  therefrom  into  the  country  till  he  should 
recover  his  strength."  He  was  away  three  weeks ;  and 
meantime  something  important  happened. 

Jefferson  suddenly  appeared  in  the  Assembly  and 
became  its  dominating  figure.  Having  "  poured  the  soul 
of  the  Continent  into  the  monumental  act  of  Independ 
ence  "  (as  Ezra  Stiles  expressed  it),  the  rising  statesman 
— able,  amazingly  energetic,  fired  afresh  with  high  am 
bition — turned  his  back  upon  Congress,  and  began  to 
busy  himself  with  vital  problems  in  Virginia.  He  wished 
to  rid  the  statute-books  of  outworn  laws,  and  bring  the 
code  into  harmony  with  the  new  spirit  and  the  new  con 
ditions.  He  struck  hard  at  primogeniture.  There  were 
fierce  contests  in  the  Old  Capitol,  and  they  ended  favor 
ably  for  Jefferson.  By  the  abolition  of  the  law  of  entails, 
aristocracy  was  given  its  finishing  stroke.  By  the  ex 
emption  of  dissenters  from  the  payment  of  taxes  for 
the  support  of  the  Established  Church,  a  forward  step 
was  taken  towards  the  law  enacted  nine  years  later, 
establishing  religious  freedom. 

Grigsby  thinks  that  no  man  living  save  Jefferson 
"  would  have  dared  to  grapple,  at  one  and  the  same  time, 
with  the  laws  of  primogeniture,  of  entails,  and  of  an 
established  church,  and  to  seek  their  instant  and  uncon 
ditional  overthrow.  Boldness  in  this  instance  was  the 
height  of  wisdom.  Had  he  postponed  his  assaults  until 
the  filaments  of  prejudice  which  had  been  broken  by 
the  Declaration  of  Independence  had  begun  to  reunite, 
nothing  short  of  a  new  revolution  would  have  rent  them 
asunder." 

274 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

Beyond  doubt  Jefferson's  work  in  November,  1776, 
was  a  master-stroke.  He  loomed  all  the  larger  because 
Henry  was  absent;  and  he  led  in  the  Assembly  with 
immunity  from  challenge  because  Mason  had  not  as  yet 
come  down  from  Fairfax.  Our  lordly  democrat  of 
"  Gunston  Hall  "  was  not  averse  to  visits  from  sergeants- 
at-arms.  On  this  occasion,  as  on  others,  he  had  to  be  sent 
for,  and  was  lugged  before  the  dais  that  he  might  excul 
pate  himself,  school-boy  fashion — perhaps  laying  his 
truancy  to  a  siege  of  the  gout.  But  as  Jefferson  had 
been  beforehand  in  clearing  the  way  for  reform,  he 
was  doubtless  glad  to  see  so  fine  an  ally.  Like  Pendle- 
ton,  Wythe,  and  Thomas  Ludwell  Lee,  Mason  joined 
hands  with  Jefferson,  and  each  bore  an  important  part 
in  recasting  the  laws  of  the  Commonwealth.  Nor 
would  it  be  just  to  the  adherents  of  the  Established 
Church  if  we  should  fail  to  pause  here  for  a  moment 
to  remark  upon  a  certain  nobility  of  theirs  when  Jeffer 
son  grappled  with  them  to  lay  them  low.  They  were 
patriots.  They  were  apprehensive  lest  a  local  religious 
struggle  within  the  grander  secular  struggle  should 
hurt  the  cause  of  America.  "  They  therefore  did  in 
truth  cast  the  Establishment  at  the  feet  of  its  enemies." 

In  these  things  just  outlined  we  have  been  telling  of 
Jefferson  the  Great;  now  immediately,  as  it  happens, 
we  come  to  speak  of  Jefferson  the  Little.  In  his 
"  Notes  on  Virginia,"  written  five  years  later,  Jefferson 
said: 

"  In  December,  1776,  our  circumstances  being  much  distressed, 
it  was  proposed,  in  the  House  of  Delegates,  to  create  a  Dictator, 
invested  with  every  power,  legislative,  executive,  and  judiciary, 
civil  and  military,  of  life  and  death  over  our  persons  and  over 
our  properties.  .  .  .  One  who  entered  into  this  contest 
from  a  pure  love  of  liberty,  and  a  sense  of  injured  rights,  who 
determined  to  make  every  sacrifice  and  meet  every  danger, 
for  the  re-establishment  of  those  rights  on  a  firm  basis  .  .  . 
must  stand  confounded  and  dismayed  when  he  is  told  that  a 

275 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

considerable  portion  of  '  the  House '  had  meditated  a  surrender 
of  them  into  a  single  hand,  and,  in  lieu  of  a  limited  monarchy, 
to  deliver  him  over  a  despotic  one.  .  .  .  The  very  thought 
alone  was  treason  against  the  people.  .  .  .  The  advocates 
of  this  measure  .  .  .  had  been  seduced  in  their  judgment 
by  the  example  of  an  ancient  republic,  whose  constitution  and 
circumstances  were  fundamentally  different." 

Jefferson  does  not  say  that  this  proposed  Dictator 
was  to  be  Patrick  Henry ;  but  he  insinuates  as  much, 
and  his  pupil  in  history,  Girardin,  developed  the  insinua 
tion  into  an  actual  charge.  "  That  Mr.  Henry  was  the 
person  in  view  for  the  dictatorship,"  wrote  Girardin,  in 
1816,  "is  well  ascertained."  He  adds:  "It  appears 
from  concurring  reports  that  this  dictatorial  scheme  pro 
duced  in  the  Legislature  unusual  heat  and  violence. 
The  members  who  favored  and  those  who  opposed  it 
walked  the  streets  on  different  sides." 

Jefferson  likewise  inspired  Wirt's  story  as  to  "  the 
mad  project  of  a  dictator."  Wirt  says : 

"  That  Mr.  Henry  was  thought  of  for  this  office  has  been 
alleged,  and  is  highly  probable;  but  that  the  project  was  sug 
gested  by  him,  or  even  received  his  countenance,  I  have  met 
with  no  one  who  will  venture  to  affirm.  There  is  a  tradition 
that  Colonel  Archibald  Gary,  the  Speaker  of  the  Senate,  was 
principally  instrumental  in  crushing  this  project;  that  meet 
ing  Colonel  Syme,  the  step-brother  [half-brother]  of  Colonel 
Henry,  in  the  lobby  of  the  House,  he  accosted  him  very 
fiercely  in  terms  like  these :  '  I  am  told  that  your  brother  wishes 
to  be  Dictator.  Tell  him  from  me  that  the  day  of  his  appoint 
ment  shall  be  the  day  of  his  death — for  he  shall  feel  my 
dagger  in  his  heart  before  the  sunset  of  that  day : '  and  the 
tradition  adds  that  Colonel  Syme,  in  great  agitation,  declared 
'  that  if  such  a  project  existed,  his  brother  had  no  hand  in  it, 
for  that  nothing  could  be  more  foreign  to  him  than  to  counte 
nance  any  office  which  would  endanger,  in  the  most  distant  man 
ner,  the  liberties  of  his  country.'  The  intrepidity  and  violence 
of  Colonel  Cary's  character  renders  the  tradition  probable ; 
but  it  furnishes  no  proof  of  Mr.  Henry's  implication  in  the 
scheme." 

276 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

If  the  Senator  from  Chesterfield  really  browbeat  the 
Delegate  from  Hanover  in  the  tragic  fashion  here  set 
forth,  then  we  have  in  Cary  of  Ampthill  one  of  the  early 
"  fire-eaters."  Evidence  of  his  combativeness — and  of 
his  ardent  patriotism,  too — may  be  found  in  many 
quarters.  Mason,  for  instance,  alludes  to  a  speech  by 
Cary,  and  rejoices  that  "  to-morrow  the  old  bruiser  *  will 
have  his  mouth  shut  in  the  chair."  In  fact,  we  are  led 
to  believe  that  if  the  terrible  Patrick,  Dictator  of  Vir 
ginia,  in  marching  at  the  head  of  his  twenty-four  lictors 
from  the  "  palace  "  to  the  Capitol,  had  met  Colonel  Cary 
opposite  the  Raleigh  Tavern,  he  would  have  caused  the 
axe  to  be  drawn  from  the  fasces  and  applied  at  once. 
"  Off  with  his  head !  So  much  for  Archibald !  "  would 
have  given  a  fine  finish  to  the  theatrical  tale  as  told  in 
tradition.  "  Apocryphal  but  thrilling,"  is  Grigsby's  ver 
dict  upon  the  alleged  happening;  and  he  proceeds  to 
note  that  Cary  himself,  by  permitting  less  than  a  quorum 
to  act  in  a  certain  war  emergency,  tolerated  not  one  dic 
tator  only,  but  many.  Moreover,  it  is  a  fact  that  General 
Washington  was  given  extraordinary  powers;  so  was 
Governor  John  Rutledge,  in  South  Carolina;  so  was 
Jefferson  himself  when,  having  succeeded  Henry,  emer 
gent  perils  arose,  necessitating  speedy  and  desperate 
endeavor. 

Not  alone  Grigsby,  but  Campbell  and  all  other  dis 
criminating  students  of  the  times  tread  gingerly  when 
they  reach  this  shaky  ground.  "  Who  they  were  that 
favored  a  dictatorship,"  says  Campbell,  "  or  where  it 
was  concocted,  or  how  developed,  does  not  appear. 
There  is  no  evidence,"  he  adds,  that  Henry  "  suggested 

*  Cary  was  known  as  "  Old  Iron,"  because  he  owned  iron 
works.  The  word  "  bruiser "  is  not  usually  applied  to  a  small 
man ;  and  perhaps  it  was  this  epithet  that  caused  Grigsby  to 
revise  his  own  prior  assertion  that  Cary  was  lower  in  stature 
than  his  big-bodied  contemporarie^ 

277 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

the  plan,  or  favored  it,  or  consented  to  it,  or  was  in  any 
way  privy  to  it."  William  Wirt  Henry  passes  over  the 
subject  with  his  accustomed  dignity  and  common-sense. 
Moses  Coit  Tyler  magnifies  it  into  a  matter  of  conse 
quence  as  affecting  Henry's  character.  Many  things 
come  to  mind  when  Patrick  Henry  is  mentioned,  and 
none  more  quickly  than  the  thought  of  him  as  the 
champion  of  liberty.  Hence  the  hurtfulness  of  the  insin 
uation  that  he  was  on  the  point  of  making  a  volte-face 
— a  monstrous  reversal  of  himself.  Tyler  dwells  too 
feelingly  upon  the  incident,  but  it  is  because  he  detects 
an  artful  twist  in  its  Monticello  interpretation. 

To  be  fair  about  it,  we  may  as  well  assume  that 
there  was  some  idle  talk  of  a  dictatorship  during  the 
Christmas  crisis  of  1776,  just  as  there  was  in  the  Tarle- 
ton  crisis  of  1781.  Let  us  remember  that  Rome  was 
very  real  to  the  educated  Virginian  of  the  time.  Old 
Rome,  old  England — these  were  the  lands  he  knew,  or 
thought  that  he  knew,  and  around  which  his  imagination 
hovered.  He  admired  the  Roman  republic.  He  was 
disposed  to  liken  himself  to  a  Roman  citizen — as  Col 
onel  Cary  may  have  likened  himself  to  Brutus.  He 
eased  his  conscience  on  the  subject  of  slavery  by  recall 
ing  the  fact  that  his  pagan  prototype  also  held  slaves. 
Thus  it  was  in  accord  with  his  classic  training  for  the 
Virginian  to  talk  of  the  "  ma gister  populi" — the  mag 
istrate  extraordinary  who,  for  six  months  and  no  more, 
might  go  forth  armed  with  terrible  powers  to  save 
the  land  from  overwhelming  disaster.  Such,  in  the 
purity  of  the  Roman  republic,  was  the  function  of  a 
dictator;  and  this  doubtless  was  the  sort  of  official 
desired  by  the  advocates  of  the  project  which  Jefferson 
seizes  upon  as  in  sharp  contrast  with  contemporary 
evidences  of  his  own  democracy.  But  Jefferson  would 
have  us  think  of  the  corrupt  days  of  the  Roman  republic 
and  of  the  usurpers  who  became  bloody  tyrants.  Again, 

278 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

as  we  ponder  over  the  matter,  we  seem  to  see  the 
bloody  Patrick,  in  his  toga  prcetexta,  raging  up  and 
down  Duke  of  Gloucester  Street,  and  perhaps  winking 
at  his  twenty-four  lictors  as  he  asks  whether  his  dear 
friend  Thomas  Jefferson  has  come  to  town  from  "  Shad- 
well." 

Jefferson  was  not  at  Williamsburg  during  the  panic 
period.  He  had  thrown  himself  into  the  work  of  re 
vising  the  laws,  and  personally  knew  nothing  of  the 
events  of  the  week  preceding  Christmas.  What  happened 
may  be  briefly  set  forth  and  easily  understood.  For 
three  months  all  news  from  the  North  had  been  bad. 
A  tremendous  cloud  hung  there.  Washington  had 
been  forced  to  let  go  his  hold  on  the  Hudson,  and  had 
crossed  the  Jersies.  But  the  disheartening  reports  gave 
rise  to  no  excitement  until  the  2Oth  of  December. 
Then,  just  as  the  Assembly  was  on  the  point  of  ad 
journing,  to  meet  again  in  March,  Purdie's  Gazette 
came  out  with  panic  news  from  Philadelphia.  The 
King's  army  was  in  the  valley  of  the  Delaware,  moving 
South.  Congress  had  fled.  "  These  are  the  times  that 
try  men's  souls,"  wrote  Paine,  in  his  "  Crisis."  To 
meet  the  emergency,  the  Assembly  resolved,  on  the  2 1st, 
"  that  the  usual  forms  of  government  should  be  sus 
pended  during  a  limited  time."  The  Senate,  where 
Colonel  Cary  sat,  so  changed  the  phrase  as  to  make 
.  it  read  "  that  additional  powers  be  given  to  the  Gov 
ernor  and  Council  for  a  limited  time."  Then  the  Leg 
islature  adjourned,  and  Henry  issued  a  proclamation 
calling  for  volunteers.  Simple  in  themselves,  these 
are  the  facts  upon  which  the  dictator  story  was  based. 
At  the  next  session  of  the  Legislature,  when  Henry 
came  up  for  reelection,  hardly  a  whisper  of  opposition 
to  him  was  heard.  He  was  reappointed  without  bal 
lot.  "  The  good  of  the  Commonwealth,"  said  he  to 
the  House,  "  shall  be  the  only  object  of  my  pursuit, 

279 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

the  plan,  or  favored  it,  or  consented  to  it,  or  was  in  any 
way  privy  to  it."  William  Wirt  Henry  passes  over  the 
subject  with  his  accustomed  dignity  and  common-sense. 
Moses  Coit  Tyler  magnifies  it  into  a  matter  of  conse 
quence  as  affecting  Henry's  character.  Many  things 
come  to  mind  when  Patrick  Henry  is  mentioned,  and 
none  more  quickly  than  the  thought  of  him  as  the 
champion  of  liberty.  Hence  the  hurtfulness  of  the  insin 
uation  that  he  was  on  the  point  of  making  a  volte-face 
— a  monstrous  reversal  of  himself.  Tyler  dwells  too 
feelingly  upon  the  incident,  but  it  is  because  he  detects 
an  artful  twist  in  its  Monticello  interpretation. 

To  be  fair  about  it,  we  may  as  well  assume  that 
there  was  some  idle  talk  of  a  dictatorship  during  the 
Christmas  crisis  of  1776,  just  as  there  was  in  the  Tarle- 
ton  crisis  of  1781.  Let  us  remember  that  Rome  was 
very  real  to  the  educated  Virginian  of  the  time.  Old 
Rome,  old  England — these  were  the  lands  he  knew,  or 
thought  that  he  knew,  and  around  which  his  imagination 
hovered.  He  admired  the  Roman  republic.  He  was 
disposed  to  liken  himself  to  a  Roman  citizen — as  Col 
onel  Cary  may  have  likened  himself  to  Brutus.  He 
eased  his  conscience  on  the  subject  of  slavery  by  recall 
ing  the  fact  that  his  pagan  prototype  also  held  slaves. 
Thus  it  was  in  accord  with  his  classic  training  for  the 
Virginian  to  talk  of  the  "  ma gister  populi" — the  mag 
istrate  extraordinary  who,  for  six  months  and  no  more, 
might  go  forth  armed  with  terrible  powers  to  save 
the  land  from  overwhelming  disaster.  Such,  in  the 
purity  of  the  Roman  republic,  was  the  function  of  a 
dictator;  and  this  doubtless  was  the  sort  of  official 
desired  by  the  advocates  of  the  project  which  Jefferson 
seizes  upon  as  in  sharp  contrast  with  contemporary 
evidences  of  his  own  democracy.  But  Jefferson  would 
have  us  think  of  the  corrupt  days  of  the  Roman  republic 
and  of  the  usurpers  who  became  bloody  tyrants.  Again, 

278 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

as  we  ponder  over  the  matter,  we  seem  to  see  the 
bloody  Patrick,  in  his  toga  pratexta,  raging  up  and 
down  Duke  of  Gloucester  Street,  and  perhaps  winking 
at  his  twenty-four  lictors  as  he  asks  whether  his  dear 
friend  Thomas  Jefferson  has  come  to  town  from  "  Shad- 
well." 

Jefferson  was  not  at  Williamsburg  during  the  panic 
period.  He  had  thrown  himself  into  the  work  of  re 
vising  the  laws,  and  personally  knew  nothing  of  the 
events  of  the  week  preceding  Christmas.  What  happened 
may  be  briefly  set  forth  and  easily  understood.  For 
three  months  all  news  from  the  North  had  been  bad. 
A  tremendous  cloud  hung  there.  Washington  had 
been  forced  to  let  go  his  hold  on  the  Hudson,  and  had 
crossed  the  Jersies.  But  the  disheartening  reports  gave 
rise  to  no  excitement  until  the  2Oth  of  December. 
Then,  just  as  the  Assembly  was  on  the  point  of  ad 
journing,  to  meet  again  in  March,  Purdie's  Gazette 
came  out  with  panic  news  from  Philadelphia.  The 
King's  army  was  in  the  valley  of  the  Delaware,  moving 
South.  Congress  had  fled.  "  These  are  the  times  that 
try  men's  souls,"  wrote  Paine,  in  his  "  Crisis."  To 
meet  the  emergency,  the  Assembly  resolved,  on  the  2 1st, 
"  that  the  usual  forms  of  government  should  be  sus 
pended  during  a  limited  time."  The  Senate,  where 
Colonel  Cary  sat,  so  changed  the  phrase  as  to  make 
.  it  read  "  that  additional  powers  be  given  to  the  Gov 
ernor  and  Council  for  a  limited  time."  Then  the  Leg 
islature  adjourned,  and  Henry  issued  a  proclamation 
calling  for  volunteers.  Simple  in  themselves,  these 
are  the  facts  upon  which  the  dictator  story  was  based. 
At  the  next  session  of  the  Legislature,  when  Henry 
came  up  for  reelection,  hardly  a  whisper  of  opposition 
to  him  was  heard.  He  was  reappointed  without  bal 
lot.  "  The  good  of  the  Commonwealth,"  said  he  to 
the  House,  "  shall  be  the  only  object  of  my  pursuit, 

279 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

and  I  shall  measure  my  happiness  according  to  the 
success  which  shall  attend  my  endeavors  to  establish 
the  public  liberty." 

In  saying  that  there  was  "  hardly  a  whisper  of 
opposition,"  it  is  not  meant  that  Henry  escaped  criti 
cism.  Landon  Carter — old,  aristocratic,  and  unsweet 
ened  of  charity — wrote  to  General  Washington : 

"  If  I  do  not  err  in  conjecture,  I  can't  help  thinking  that  the 
head  of  our  Commonwealth  has  as  great  a  palace  of  fear  and 
apprehension  as  can  bless  the  heart  of  any  human  being;  and 
if  we  compare  rumor  with  act1  '  movements,  I  believe  it 
will  prove  itself  to  every  sensible  man.  As  soon  as  the 
Congress^  sent  for  our  First,  Third,  Fourth,  Fifth,  and  Sixth 
regiments  to  assist  you  in  contest  against  the  enemy  where 
they  really  were  .  .  .  there  got  a  report  among  the  soldiery 
that  Dignity  would  not  reside  in  Williamsburg  without  two 
thousand  men  under  arms  to  guard  him.  This  had  like  to 
have  occasioned  a  mutiny.  A  desertion  of  many  from  the 
several  companies  did  follow;  boisterous  fellows  resisting,  and 
swearing  they  would  not  leave  their  county.  .  .  .  What  a 
finesse  of  popularity  was  this?  ...  As  soon  as  the  regi 
ments  were  gone,  this  great  man  found  an  interest  with  the 
Council  of  State,  perhaps  as  timorous  as  himself,  to  issue 
orders  for  the  militia  of  twenty-six  counties,  and  five  companies 
of  a  Minute  battalion,  to  march  to  Williamsburg,  to  protect 
him  only  against  his  own  fears ;  and  to  make  this  the  more 
popular,  it  was  endeavored  that  the  House  of  Delegates  should 
give  it  a  countenance,  but,  as  good  luck  would  have  it,  it  was 
with  difficulty  refused.  .  .  .  Immediately  then  ...  a 
bill  is  brought  in  to  remove  the  seat  of  government — some  say 
up  to  Hanover,  to  be  called  Henry-Town." 

Dr.  Tyler  aptly  remarks  that  the  criticism  of  the 
carping  and  rancorous  Colonel  Carter  *  qualifies  some- 

*  This  quaint  bit  from  Landon  Carter's  diary  elucidates  his 
own  character  as  well  as  that  of  Ralph  Wormley,  or  Worme- 
ley :  "  Wormeley,  as  usual  boisterous  and  contradictory,  close- 
wedded  to  some  side  in  every  argument,  so  that  to  convince 
is  impossible.  I  don't  know  what  to  make  of  the  man;  he  is 

280 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

what  "  that  stream  of  honeyed  testimony  respecting 
Patrick  Henry  which  commonly  flows  down  upon  us 
so  copiously  from  all  that  period." 

With  respect  to  the  Hanover  Town  mentioned  in  the 
letter,  he  who  now  visits  it  finds  but  an  open  field 
on  the  banks  of  the  Pamunkey.  Anciently  it  was  Page's 
Warehouse,  and  in  colonial  times  it  was  not  uncommon 
to  see,  in  the  main  road  leading  down,  a  mile-long 
procession  of  hogsheads,  each  turning  upon  a  central 
bar,  and  rolling  readily  to  the  tug  of  ox,  horse,  or  mule. 
At  the  wharves  were  many  sloops  and  schooners.  This 
was  the  place  that  came  within  one  vote  of  securing  the 
Capitol  when  it  was  decided  to  transfer  the  public 
offices  inland  from  Williamsburg.  Hanover  Town  lost 
in  the  contest,  and  vanished;  Richmond  won,  and  soon 
grew  to  be  a  beautiful  city. 

That  the  "  honeyed  testimony "  respecting  Henry 
may  not  cloy  upon  us,  another  letter  severely  criticising 
his  administration  is  now  offered.  It  was  written  by 
St.  George  Tucker — the  same  who  furnished  the  court 
room  description  already  cited — and  was  addressed  to 
Colonel  Theoderick  Bland,  Jr.  Henry  had  just  quit  the 
Governor's  chair,  and  Jefferson  was  in  his  place. 
Tucker  said: 

"  I  wish  his  Excellency's  activity  may  be  equal  to  the 
abilities  he  possesses  in  so  eminent  a  degree.  In  that  case  we 
may  boast  of  having  the  greatest  man  on  the  continent  at  the 
helm.  But  if  he  should  tread  in  the  steps  of  his  predecessor, 
there  is  not  much  to  be  expected  from  the  brightest  talents. 
Did  the  enemy  know  how  very  defenceless  we  are  at  present, 
a  very  small  addition  to  their  late  force  would  be  sufficient 
to  commit  the  greatest  ravages  throughout  the  country.  It 

very  sensible,  but  in  that  most  intolerable.  He  gave  me  several 
chops;  at  last  I  advised  him  to  read  Delianeus'  botany,  and  he 
could  find  that  Princess  feathers  and  coxcombs  were  so  nearly 
allied  that  both  came  from  the  amaranthus.  He  took  me; 
and,  as  it  cut  deep,  he  endeavored  to  put  it  off  with  a  laugh." 

281 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

is  a  melancholy  fact  that  there  were  not  arms  enough  to 
put  into  the  hands  of  the  few  militia  who  were  called  down 
on  the  late  occasion ;  of  those  which  were  to  be  had  a  great 
number  were  not  fit  for  use.  Nor  was  there  by  any  means  a 
sufficiency  of  ammunition  or  camp  utensils  of  any  kind.  In 
short,  never  was  a  country  in  a  more  shabby  situation ;  for  our 
fortifications  and  marine,  on  which  more  than  a  million  have 
been  thrown  away,  are  in  no  capacity  to  render  any  service 
to  us;  nor  have  we  any  standing  force  to  give  the  smallest 
check  to  an  approaching  enemy.  In  two  days  after  the  depart 
ure  of  the  fleet,  they  might  have  returned  and  found  nobody 
to  oppose  them.  Such  wisdom,  energy,  and  foresight  do  our 
leaders  display." 

This,  of  course,  is  a  real  criticism  in  comparison 
with  Landon  Carter's  pettish  flings.  It  is  an  arraign 
ment,  and  would  put  every  Henryite  on  his  mettle  were 
it  not  well  understood  that  Tucker  had  taken  umbrage 
at  Henry's  treatment  of  him  the  year  before.  When  a 
man  is  in  a  miff,  he  is  apt  to  darken  his  thoughts  of 
the  wretch  who  crossed  him ;  and  for  months  the  sensi 
tive  Tucker  was  sorely  piqued  because  on  a  certain 
occasion  the  Governor  had  given  him  censure  instead 
of  praise.  While  in  Charleston,  S.  C,  as  an  agent  for 
Virginia,  Tucker  took  ^500  out  of  his  own  pocket  that 
he  might  buy  and  ship  indigo  to  be  exchanged  for 
arms.  At  Williamsburg  he  called  upon  the  Governor's 
Council  to  ask  for  reimbursement.  He  says: 

"  I  believe  I  attended  twice  before  I  had  the  honor  of  ad 
mittance  to  the  Council  board,  when  Governor  Henry  received 
'me  like  a  great  man.  I  was  not  asked  to  sit  down,  I  was  not 
thanked  for  my  zeal  and  expedition,  or  for  advancing  my 
money.  Mr.  Henry  made  some  remarks  upon  the  high  price 
I  had  given  for  the  indigo — said  it  was  more  than  the  State 
had  bought  it  for  before  (which  was  very  true,  for  depreciation 
had  then  begun),  and  that  I  appeared  to  have  been  too  much  in 
a  hurry  to  make  the  purchase.  I  felt  indignation  flash  from 
my  eyes,  and  I  feel  it  at  my  heart  at  this  moment.  I  am  there 
fore  an  unfit  person  to  draw  an  exact  portrait  of  Mr.  Henry, 
or  to  give  a  fair  estimate  of  his  character." 

282 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

Here  we  have  a  clear,  sharp  view  of  Henry  as 
executive  officer  of  the  Commonwealth.  The  room  is 
well  lighted  for  us.  The  whole  scene  stands  out.  It 
is  not  the  orator  who  turns  in  his  chair  and  looks 
towards  us ;  it  is  the  business  man.  We  remember  that 
he  has  been  spoken  of  as  one  who  shuns  business — 
who  is  impatient  of  details.  Therefore  we  are  aston 
ished  at  the  sharpness  of  his  questions,  and  at  the 
pains  he  takes  to  see  that  the  public  has  not  been 
victimized,  even  in  so  small  a  transaction  as  the  one 
he  is  considering.  Evidently  he  has  informed  himself 
as  to  the  price  of  indigo ;  and  we  suspect  that  he  knows 
a  great  deal  about  all  such  practical  things.  He  is  soon 
to  take  an  important  stand  against  engrossing,  so  he 
must  have  an  intimate  knowledge  of  true  prices  and 
false  ones;  and  indeed,  being  a  faithful  servant  of  the 
State,  he  must  look  sharply  in  her  behalf — even  as 
he  is  doing  at  this  moment.  So  we  say  to  ourselves, 
as  we  watch  the  scene  between  the  war  Governor  and 
the  high-spirited  youth  who  stands  before  him — flushed, 
inwardly  a-quiver,  angry  with  an  anger  that  will  take 
long  to  cool.  Our  sympathies  cannot  but  be  with  the 
younger  man;  though  we  must  admit  that  if  we  were 
aware  of  all  the  harassments  to  which  the  other  had 
been  subjected  of  late,  we  probably  should  excuse  him 
for  his  lack  of  suavity  on  this  occasion.  It  is  clear  that 
when  Henry  was  bent  upon  the  execution  of  public 
duties,  he  hardened  much  in  manner.  We  recall  that 
he  mistrusted  Carter  Braxton  and  did  not  cloak  his 
mistrust.  We  see  that  he  was  displeased  with  young 
Tucker  and  did  not  conceal  his  displeasure.  But  it 
was  Henry  the  official  who  so  appeared.  Socially  he 
was  a  different  man.  Having  met  him  in  company 
a  long  while  afterwards,  Tucker  said  of  him :  "  His 
manners  were  the  perfection  of  urbanity;  his  conver 
sation  various,  entertaining,  instructive,  and  fascinat- 

283 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

ing.  I  parted  from  him  with  infinite  regret,  and  forgot 
for  the  whole  time  I  was  with  him  that  I  had  so  many 
years  borne  in  mind  an  expression  which  might  not 
have  been  intended  to  wound  me  as  it  did.'' 

Obviously,  then,  there  is  little  to  Tucker's  strictures. 
But  heedless  of  the  admitted  animus  back  of  them, 
or  perhaps  ignorant  with  respect  to  it,  some  of  the 
writers  of  to-day  blame  Henry  and  the  Revolutionary 
Legislature  for  permitting  Virginia  to  remain  unde 
fended  against  such  incursions  as  that  of  Matthews. 
But  it  will  not  do  to  lose  sight  of  the  fact  that  Vir 
ginia  was  open  to  the  ocean.  Her  bay,  and  the  numer 
ous  arms  of  that  bay,  exposed  her  to  the  attacks  of 
an  enemy  especially  powerful  on  the  water.  It  was 
impossible  for  Henry  to  stretch  chevaux-de-frise  from 
cape  to  cape.  He  could  only  fortify  such  points  as  York- 
town,  and  provide  a  fleet  of  war-vessels  to  keep  the 
Chesapeake  whipped  clean  of  Tory  marauders  and 
escort  the  State's  trading  craft  out  and  in  on  their  West 
Indian  voyages.  He  controlled  a  navy  board  which  built 
and  equipped  seventeen  ships,  fifteen  brigs,  nineteen 
schooners,  fifteen  galleys,  two  pilot-boats,  and  two 
barges.  He  established  dockyards  and  naval  depots,  im 
ported  gunpowder,  manufactured  gunpowder,  and  mined 
lead.  Much  recruiting  for  other  States  was  done  in  Vir 
ginia,  and  Henry  helped  it  along  whenever  he  could. 
He  kept  up  Virginia's  Continental  quota  of  some  six 
thousand  men,  and  was  frequently  occupied  in  looking 
after  the  four  or  five  thousand  militia.  He  supplied 
the  Virginia  soldiers  in  Washington's  army  with  cloth 
ing  and  foot-leather,  and  was  tireless  in  his  efforts  to 
keep  that  army  from  starving.  His  zeal  and  vigor  in 
this  business  entitle  him  to  the  highest  honor  as  a 
guardian  of  America  in  her  time  of  trial.  It  is  a  great 
glory  of  Henry's  that  he  sent  all  the  cattle  he  could 
gather  to  feed  the  poor  fellows  at  Valley  Forge.  No  one 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

took  the  troubles  of  the  "  ragged  Continentals  "  more 
to  heart  than  did  the  Governor  of  Virginia. 

It  may,  or  may  not,  be  that  Henry  saw  behind  the 
enemy's  grand  plan  of  campaign,  which  was  to  cut 
the  colonies  apart  on  the  line  of  the  Hudson.  Here 
was  the  weakest  link  in  the  chain,  geographically  and 
politically.  That  was  why  Burgoyne  tried  to  reach 
down  from  Canada  to  join  hands  with  Howe,  who, 
by  an  egregious  blunder,  withdrew  during  the  crucial 
period  to  another  field.  But  even  if  Henry  did  not 
understand  the  grand  strategy  of  the  war,  he  had  some 
warrant  in  assuming  that  the  real  fighting  was  likely 
to  continue  in  the  North.  What,  indeed,  would  it 
profit  the  British  if  they  should  land  a  great  army 
in  Virginia  and  overrun  the  State?  The  people  them 
selves  were  hardly  conquerable.  They  would  move 
to  the  mountains,  and,  when  the  enemy  had  departed, 
would  return  to  their  devastated  homes.  But  that 
would  not  help  the  King.  So  thinking,  and  being  ready 
to  risk  much  since  much  was  to  be  gained,  Henry 
stripped  Virginia  of  arms  and  provisions  and  sent  them 
to  Washington's  camp.  Students  who  examine  the 
Calendar  of  State  Papers  become  convinced  that  the 
resources  of  the  Commonwealth  were  practically  ex 
hausted  in  behalf  of  the  Union.  This  is  one  reason 
why  the  militia  were  poorly  equipped,  and  why  they 
were  ineffective  when  Tarleton  went  careering  through 
the  State.  There  was  no  lack  of  men,  but  they  were 
scattered  over  counties  forty  miles  square ;  and  they 
had  few  arms.  Unquestionably  Henry  made  mistakes, 
but  in  the  main  his  course  was  admirable. 

Henry  was  not  only  painstaking  in  the  performance 
of  his  set  duties,  but  was  watchful  of  the  larger  matters. 
He  secured  foreign  loans ;  he  looked  sagaciously  be 
yond  the  Alleghanies,  and  he  handled  his  pen  with 
vigor  and  effectiveness.  Of  his  twenty-one  existing 

285 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

letters  to  Washington  and  of  Washington's  thirty-four 
letters  to  him,  the  greater  number  deal  with  the  affairs 
of  this  period.  So  with  the  letters  to  and  from  Richard 
Henry  Lee.  We  note  eighteen  letters  from  Henry  to 
Lee,  and  thirty-six  from  Lee  to  Henry.  Eight  of  the 
latter  were  found  by  accident  among  some  of  Mayo 
Cabell's  papers  at  Union  Hill,  where  Henry,  who  took 
slight  trouble  to  preserve  his  Revolutionary  correspond 
ence,  is  supposed  to  have  left  them.  There  was  also  a 
Washington  letter  in  the  lot.  No  one  knows,  of  course, 
how  many  precious  documents  bearing  the  signature  of 
Washington,  Lee,  or  Henry  were  used  to  light  the 
fires,  or  "  stop  a  hole  to  keep  the  wind  away."  It  is 
a  fact  that  a  good  Virginia  housekeeper  kept  the  mould 
out  of  her  preserves  with  covers  cut  from  George 
Mason's  letters.  At  a  time  when  and  a  place  where 
paper  was  scarce,  we  can  imagine  how  great  a  tempta 
tion  it  was  to  ransack  the  garret  for  needed  scraps. 
Perhaps  the  searcher  hesitated  the  less  if  perchance  her 
eye  fell  upon  some  such  postscript  as  that  in  a  letter 
written  by  Robert  Munford,  who  was  a  constant  guest 
at  Colonel  Washington's  table  during  the  campaign  of 
1758.  Munford's  message  was  to  his  aunt,  and  was 
couched  in  ten  words :  "  I  am  well  and  lousie,  and  still 
your  affectionate  nephew."  But,  as  Fisher  Ames  said, 
"  it  is  natural  that  the  gratitude  of  mankind  should  be 
drawn  to  their  benefactors  "  ;  therefore  we  are  sorry  that 
preserves  were  so  much  liked  in  old  Virginia,  and  we 
are  glad  to  have  certain  letters  that  corroding  time  has 
left  us.  Those  that  passed  between  Henry  and  Lee  tell 
of  their  hopes,  their  fears,  and  their  efforts  to  strengthen 
the  credit  of  the  country  and  keep  the  army  up  to  the 
mark.  They  impart  confidences.  The  writers  mutually 
encourage  each  other.  One  suggests  in  Philadelphia 
something  that  the  other  may  act  on  in  Virginia ;  and  so 
it  goes,  turn  and  turn  about.  Lee  was  indefatigable. 

286 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

He  must  have  been  a  great  man — a  great  patriot. 
Hampden,  Sidney,  and  Pelham  had  been  his  heroes 
and  models  when  he  was  a  youth.  He  was  so  diffident 
that  he  never  thought  of  himself  as  an  orator  until  one 
day,  in  the  House,  his  brother,  Thomas  Ludwell,  also 
a  member,  was  subjected  to  an  indignity.  Then,  get 
ting  upon  his  feet,  Richard  Henry  discovered  and  dis 
closed  himself  as  one  of  the  most  eloquent  of  men.  Just 
before  the  war,  he  was  shooting  swans  on  the  Potomac 
when  his  gun  burst ;  and,  after  that,  he  wore  a  silk 
wrapping  on  one  hand  to  hide  the  loss  of  its  fingers. 
Ever  since  Stamp  Act  times  Henry  and  Lee  had  worked 
together.  Speaking  of  their  warm  friendship,  Lee's 
grandson  and  biographer  says : 

"  This  was  the  certain  consequence  of  the  intercourse  of  men 
of  such  congenial  feeling  and  similar  principles.  This  friend 
ship  and  harmony  of  principle  existed  till  their  death.  Two 
such  men,  during  the  period  which  followed,  acting  in  close 
and  active  concert,  must  have  had  a  powerful  influence  on  the 
public  opinions  and  proceedings  of  their  native  State.  And, 
indeed,  to  the  genius,  integrity,  and  eloquence  of  these  great 
men  may  be  attributed,  in  a  very  considerable  degree,  the 
confessedly  distinguished  part  which  Virginia  acted  in  the 
Revolution.  They  aroused  their  fellow-citizens  to  a  sense  of 
their  danger;  they  cheered  and  animated  them  in  the  dark 
hours  of  war  and  desolation ;  suggested  the  most  efficient  means 
of  resistance;  and  directed  the  patriotism,  they  so  generally 
found,  to  the  wisest  ends.  .  .  .  Mr.  Henry  observed  to  a 
son  of  Richard  Henry  Lee,  who  had  the  pleasure  of  serving 
a  session  some  years  afterwards  with  him :  '  Your  father,  sir, 
and  myself  always  agreed  upon  the  great  principles  of  free 
dom.  We  differed  on  some  questions  of  internal  policy,  but 
liberty  alike  we  fondly  loved.' " 

"Plain,  solid  common  sense,"  Campbell  assures  us, 
"  was  the  distinguishing  characteristic  of  his  [R.  H. 
Lee's]  mind  as  it  was  of  Mr.  Henry's." 

Much  mystery  has  been  made  of  "the  Lee  scandal," 
287 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

so  called.  In  truth,  there  was  no  actual  basis  for  scandal. 
In  1776,  foreseeing  the  depreciation  of  Continental  cur 
rency,  he  stipulated  that  his  tenants  should  pay  him 
in  tobacco  instead  of  paper  money ;  or,  if  not  in  tobacco, 
in  gold  or  silver.  For  this  he  was  deprived  of  his  seat 
in  Congress;  but  after  an  excusatory  address  in  the 
Assembly — a  speech  that  brought  tears,  'tis  said — he 
was  reflected,  greatly  to  Patrick  Henry's  relief  and  joy. 
Lee,  Henry,  Washington,  and  Mason  all  looked  after 
their  own  during  the  Revolution.  We  expect  a  great 
deal  of  our  heroes,  but  it  is  hardly  fair  to  insist  that 
they  shall  throw  their  families  out  at  the  window.  The 
pay  for  public  service  was  small ;  and  it  was  a  point  of 
honor  in  America  in  those  days  to  accept  no  gift  that 
smacked  of  bribery.  "  A  neighbor  of  his,"  writes  Henry 
Clay  of  his  preceptor,  the  great  George  Wythe,  "  Mr.  H., 
who  had  the  reputation  of  being  a  West  Indian  nabob, 
and  who  at  the  time  had  an  important  suit  pending  in 
the  Court  of  Chancery,  sent  him  a  demijohn  of  old 
arrack,  and  an  orange-tree  for  his  niece,  Miss  Nelson, 
then  residing  with  him.  Wythe  sent  them  back,  saying 
that  he  had  long  since  ceased  to  make  use  of  arrack, 
and  that  Miss  Nelson  had  no  conservatory." 

Richard  Henry  Lee  certainly  was  needed  in  Philadel 
phia  in  1777,  and  from  that  time  on  till  the  war  ended. 
The  character  of  Congress  was  changing.  Some  of  the 
strong  men  were  out,  and  their  places  had  been  taken 
by  weaklings.  On  one  occasion,  Henry  Laurens,  then 
president,  "  so  far  forgot  himself  as  to  answer  from  the 
chair  an  honorable  member  from  North  Carolina  [Mr. 
Penn]  by  singing  aloud :  '  Poor  little  Penny,  poor  little 
Penny ;  sing  tan-tarra-ra-ra.' ':  But  for  the  decadence 
of  Congress,  it  is  unlikely  that  the  Conway  Cabal  would 
have  come  to  a  head.  Conway,  a  Count,  was  of  Irish 
blood,  but  French  by  birth  and  training.  It  is  apolo 
getically  that  we  make  use  of  the  word  "  Irish  "  here, 

288 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

for  the  men  of  that  stock  bore  a  great  part  in  the  Rev 
olution.  The  splendid  French  regiments  at  Yorktown 
were  officered  by  Irishmen  educated  in  France.  The 
Continental  Army  was  largely  recruited  among  the 
Irish,  especially  the  Pennsylvania  part  of  it.  Harsh 
laws  had  driven  many  Irish  Catholics  out  of  Maryland, 
and  they  formed  the  bulk  of  the  Pennsylvania  line.  It 
is  said  that  upon  Wayne's  call  for  volunteers,  at  the 
storming  of  Stony  Point,  there  was  no  response  at  first. 
But  by  and  by,  in  the  darkness  there,  a  voice  was  heard : 
"  Gin'ral !  Give  us  a  gill  apiece,  and  we'll  shiver  it  out 
with  you."  Whereupon  the  "  gill  apiece  "  was  supplied, 
and  they  all  shivered  it  out,  incidentally  shivering  the 
rock-bound  fortress  of  kingly  power  in  that  part  of  the 
continent. 

Conway  and  Charles  Lee  were  cosmopolites — bold 
adventurers.  They  had  acquired  the  art  of  double-deal 
ing  in  the  European  school  of  sliding  panels  and  courtly 
hocus-pocus.  Lee,  especially,  knew  his  "Tartufe."  His 
mask  was  eccentricity.  How  he  hoodwinked  Washing 
ton  is  hard  to  understand,  unless  we  assume  that,  being 
personally  unfamiliar  with  the  refinements  of  civilized 
guile,  Washington  was  too  generous,  too  unwilling  to 
suspect,  too  high-minded.  Had  Lee  worn  a  red  skin, 
Washington  would  have  read  him  through  and  through 
very  quickly.  As  it  was,  he  bore  with  him  on  the  theory 
that  treachery  and  an  illuminated  mind,  such  as  Lee 
seemed  to  have,  do  not  go  together.  Lee  was  second 
in  command,  and  wished  to  be  first — either  for  the  glory 
of  it,  or  that  he  might  sell  America  to  the  King.  When 
Washington  was  west  of  the  Hudson,  he  begged  Lee, 
who  was  east  of  it,  to  cross  the  river  and  reunite  the 
two  wings  of  the  army.  Lee  disobeyed ;  hence  Washing 
ton  was  forced  to  retreat  to  the  Delaware  at  the  risk  of 
his  troops  and  his  reputation.  Lee's  subsequent  "  cap 
ture  "  was  a  suspicious  proceeding ;  and,  while  he  was  a 
19  289 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

prisoner,  he  devised  the  Philadelphia  campaign  for  the 
Howes — an  act  of  treachery  long  unknown  to  the  world, 
but  now  beyond  dispute.  Not  until  the  battle  of  Mon- 
mouth  did  Washington  smite  Lee  and  strip  him. 

Conway's  machinations  were  unlike  Lee's,  who  worked 
alone.  Conway  involved  many  men  of  influence  in  his 
intrigue.  Gates,  Reed,  Mifflin,  and  Rush  are  thought 
to  have  been  active  in  the  Cabal,  which  was  coincident 
with  Lee's  scheming,  but  probably  unconnected  with  it. 
Conway  used  Gates  against  Washington,  who  had  just 
lost  two  battles,  and  lost  the  capital,  too ;  whereas  Gates 
had  just  won  a  victory  so  great  that  the  whole  world 
heard  of  it,  and  understood  its  significance.  We  now  see 
that  if  Washington  had  not  held  him  on  the  Delaware, 
Howe  would  have  returned  to  New  York,  marched  up 
the  Hudson,  and  cooperated  with  Burgoyne,  and  to 
gether  they  probably  would  have  cut  the  country  in  half. 
It  has  been  shown  that  this  was  the  plan ;  and  there  is  no 
doubt  that  Howe  thought  he  could  take  Philadelphia, 
and  get  back  to  New  York  in  time  to  execute  his  part 
of  the  grand  operation.  So,  indirectly,  Washington 
was  as  much  the  victor  of  Saratoga  as  Gates,  but  in  the 
smoke  and  dust  and  heat  of  the  time  few  men  realized  it. 
Whether  Patrick  Henry  grasped  the  truth,  or  whether 
he  shared  the  common  feeling  that  Gates  was  to  be 
credited  with  the  Saratoga  victory,  it  is  not  possible  to 
say.  When  Gates,  then  humiliated  by  his  Carolina  de 
bacle,  passed  through  Richmond  in  1780,  Henry  was 
hearty  in  his  greeting,  studiously  sympathetic,  and  at 
tentive  in  every  way.  But  we  know  from  his  own  testi 
mony  that  he  never  ceased  to  regard  Washington  as  the 
genius  of  the  war.  Imagine  his  disgust,  therefore,  when 
he  became  aware  of  an  attempt  to  draw  him  into  the 
Conway  conspiracy!  His  first  inkling  of  the  business 
was  in  January,  1778,  when  an  unsigned  letter,  under 
Yorktown  date,  was  placed  in  his  hands.  It  dwelt  upon 

290 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

present  perils  and  past  mistakes,  artfully  flattered  Henry 
himself,  and  proceeded  thus : 

"But  is  our  case  desperate?  By  no  means.  We  have 
wisdom,  virtue,  and  strength  enough  to  save  us,  if  they  could 
be  drawn  into  action.  The  Northern  Army  has  shown  us  what 
Americans  are  capable  of  doing,  with  a  general  at  their  head. 
The  spirit  of  the  Southern  Army  is  no  way  inferior  to  the 
spirit  of  the  Northern.  A  Gates,  a  Lee,  or  a  Conway  would 
in  a  few  weeks  render  them  an  irresistible  body  of  men.  The 
last  of  the  above  officers  has  accepted  of  the  new  office  of 
Inspector-General  of  our  Army,  in  order  to  reform  abuses; 
but  the  remedy  is  only  a  palliative  one.  In  one  of  his  letters 
to  a  friend  he  says :  '  A  great  and  good  God  hath  decreed 
America  to  be  free — or  the  .  .  .  and  weak  counsellors 
would  have  ruined  her  long  ago.' " 

"  Even  the  letter  must  be  thrown  into  the  fire,"  con 
cluded  the  epistolary  patriot. 

Instead  of  burning  it,  Henry  enclosed  it,  with  a  letter 
of  his  own,  to  Washington.  Governor  Rutledge,  of 
South  Carolina,  it  should  be  said,  did  the  same  with  a 
similar  communication.  Henry  wrote  that  it  gave  him 
pain  to  do  as  he  was  doing. 

"  But,"  he  said,  "  there  may  be  some  scheme  or  party  form 
ing  to  your  prejudice.  ...  I  am  sorry  there  should  be  one 
man  who  counts  himself  my  friend  who  is  not  yours.  .  .  . 
Believe  me,  sir,  I  have  too  high  a  sense  of  the  obligations 
America  has  to  you  to  abet  or  countenance  so  unworthy  a 
proceeding.  ...  It  would  suit  my  inclination  better  to 
give  you  some  assistance  in  the  great  business  of  the  war.  But 
I  will  not  conceal  anything  from  you  by  which  you  may  be 
affected;  for  I  really  think  your  personal  welfare  and  the 
happiness  of  America  are  intimately  connected. ' 

Henry  calculated  the  time  it  would  take  for  his  warn 
ing  letter  to  go  and  an  answer  to  come.  Manifestly,  he 
was  anxious  in  the  matter,  for,  when  the  expected  reply 
failed  to  reach  him,  he  wrote  again,  with  deep  feeling: 

291 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

"  While  you  face  the  armed  enemies  of  our  liberty  in  the 
iield,  and,  by  the  favor  of  God,  have  been  kept  unhurt,  I  trust 
your  country  will  never  harbor  in  her  bosom  the  miscreant  who 
would  ruin  her  best  supporter.  I  wish  not  to  flatter,  but 
when  arts,  unworthy  honest  men,  are  used  to  defame  and  tra 
duce  you,  I  think  it  not  amiss,  but  a  duty,  to  assure  you  of 
that  estimation  in  which  the  public  hold  you.  Not  that  I  think 
that  any  testimony  I  can  bear  is  necessary  for  your  support, 
or  private  satisfaction;  for  a  bare  recollection  of  what  is  past 
must  give  you  sufficient  pleasure  in  every  circumstance  of  life. 
But  I  cannot  help  assuring  you,  on  this  occasion,  of  the  high 
sense  of  gratitude  which  all  ranks  of  men  in  this  your  native 
country  bear  to  you.  It  will  give  me  sincerest  pleasure  to 
manifest  my  regards,  and  render  my  best  services  to  you  and 
yours.  I  do  not  like  to  make  a  parade  of  these  things,  and 
I  know  that  you  are  not  fond  of  it;  however,  I  hope  the 
occasion  will  plead  my  excuse." 

There  is  a  marked  difference  in  the  tone  of  Wash 
ington's  two  letters  in  reply  to  Henry's  two.  The  first 
is  merely  courteous;  the  second  is  characterized  by 
warmth  and  glow,  and  imparts  much  confidential  matter. 
He  thinks  that  Dr.  Rush  was  Henry's  tempter,  judging 
from  "  a  similitude  of  hands."  He  adds  that  "  General 
Gates  was  to  be  exalted  on  the  ruin  of  my  reputation 
and  influence.  .  .  .  General  Mifflin,  it  is  commonly 
supposed,  bore  the  second  part  in  the  cabal ;  and  General 
Conway,  I  know,  was  a  very  active  and  malignant 
partisan." 

The  light  of  clay  destroyed  the  dark  thing  of  which 
we  have  been  telling  as  illustrative  of  the  varied  experi 
ences  in  Henry's  life.  Though  Henry  no  doubt  heard 
with  interest  of  the  duel  in  which  Cadwalader  caused 
Conway  literally  to  taste  lead,  it  is  improbable  that  he 
followed  the  adventurer's  career  in  far-away  Pondi- 
cherry.  But  if  he  did,  he  must  have  smiled  when  told 
that  Conway  had  got  into  a  snarl  there  with  the  famous 
Tippoo  Tib,  just  as  he  had  done  with  our  own  famous 
Washington. 

292 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

During  these  war  days,  Henry  came  in  contact  with 
many  French  officers  and  other  foreigners  who  had  ad 
ventured  hither  to  help  America — or,  in  numerous  in- 
tances,  to  help  themselves.  Thus,  for  example,  he  fur 
thered  the  bold  scheme  of  Captain  Cotteneau,  who  later 
served  with  Paul  Jones.  Henry  was  of  the  mind  to  lend 
Cotteneau  a  twenty-gun  Virginia  ship  to  "  attack  our 
foes  in  Africa."  "  I  long  for  something  of  the  eclat  that 
would  attend  such  an  enterprise,"  said  he.  Not  a  few 
of  his  foreign  visitors  merely  pestered  him  with  im 
practical  schemes  ;  others  won  his  admiration.  In  grati 
tude  for  certain  kind  words,  Lafayette  wrote  to  him;  a 
correspondence  followed,  and  the  two  formed  a  lasting 
friendship.  That  with  Albert  Gallatin  belongs  to  a 
somewhat  later  period.  "  Patrick  Henry  advised  me 
to  go  West,"  said  Gallatin,  "  where  I  might  study  law  if 
I  chose ;  but  predicted  that  I  was  intended  for  a  states 
man,  and  told  me  that  this  was  the  career  which  should 
be  my  aim ;  he  also  rendered  me  several  services  on  more 
than  one  occasion."  Colonel  Patrick  Henry  Fontaine 
says  that  his  grandfather  drew  upon  the  Latin  of  his 
"  Mount  Brilliant  "  days  to  piece  out  conversations  with 
the  young  Swiss,  but  since  Gallatin  was  in  Virginia  as 
interpreter  for  M.  Savary  de  Valcoulon,  who  had  a  claim 
against  the  State,  the  story  is  dubious.  Doubtless  Henry 
knew  enough  French  to  read  and  smile  over  some 
superscriptions  which  ran :  "  Son  Altesse  Roy  ale,  Mon 
sieur  Patrick  Henri,  Gouverneur  de  I'Etat  de  Virginie" 
The  address  must  have  made  him  think  of  General 
Charles  Lee,  who,  now  disgraced,  dwelt  by  the  Shenan- 
doah,  with  his  dogs  as  his  only  friends. 

Appreciative  as  he  was  of  such  sterling  characters  as 
Lafayette  and  Gallatin,  there  is  no  doubt  that  Henry  was 
more  at  home  with  men  like  George  Rogers  Clark.  It 
is  time  to  refer  to  Clark's  brilliant  stroke  beyond  the 
mountains ;  and  this  means  that  we  must  tell  of  Clark's 

293 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

relations  with  Patrick  Henry.  Jefferson  knew  Clark  as 
a  boy,  when,  with  a  bag  of  corn  in  front  of  him,  he 
reined  his  horse  along  the  road  towards  Shadwell  grist 
mill.*  Thus  Virginia  has  its  mill-boy  of  Albemarle  as 
well  as  of  "  The  Slashes."  Surveying  was  Clark's  study 
— the  border  his  romantic  lure.  At  twenty  he  was  with 
Dunmore  on  the  Ohio ;  later  he  was  in  Kentucky ;  now, 
at  twenty-three,  we  find  him  ending  an  overland  pilgrim 
age  of  five  hundred  miles  at  Governor  Henry's  home 
in  Hanover.  If  we  make  for  ourselves  a  mental  sketch 
of  Clark — robust,  soldierly,  fluent  of  speech,  a  sunburnt 
ranger  in  buckskin — as  he  sat  in  the  hall  of  "  Scotch- 
town  "  house,  talking  with  Henry,  then  on  sick-leave 
and  no  doubt  showing  sallowness,  we  have  a  bit  of  a 
scene  that  belongs  to  a  series  of  historic  pictures.  Such 
a  series,  we  mean,  as  might  well  grace  the  Capitols  of 
Ohio,  Indiana,  Illinois,  Michigan,  and  Wisconsin;  for 
these  States  were  carved  out  of  the  territory  secured  by 
Clark — Henry  and  others  helping.  At  this  interview 
Clark  told  Henry  that  the  settlers  in  Kentucky  had  sent 
him  after  powder.  They  needed  it  for  use  against  the 
Indians ;  and  if  Virginia  would  supply  it — so  much  the 
better  for  Virginia.  Henry  had  long  been  apprehensive 
lest  an  enemy  should  come  out  of  the  West  as  well  as  the 
East.  The  Cherokees,  stirred  to  war  by  Stuart  and  other 
British  emissaries,  had  risen  under  Dragging  Canoe  and 
Oconostota,  but  Christian,  Shelby,  and  that  "  rear-guard 

*  In  his  elaborate  volumes,  "  Conquest  of  the  Country  North 
west  of  the  River  Ohio,  1778-1783,  and  Life  of  General  George 
Rogers  Clark,"  William  Hayden  English  expresses  doubt  as 
to  whether  Jefferson  knew  Clark  as  a  lad.  From  the  minute 
ness  of  his  studies  one  might  suppose  that  Mr.  English  had 
exhausted  the  subject,  but  there  is  still  much  undigested  Clark 
material  in  the  Virginia  archives.  Mr.  English  gives  Patrick 
Henry  great  credit  for  his  spirited  furtherance  of  Clark's  work. 
When  Clark  had  captured  Fort  Sackville  at  Vincennes,  he 
renamed  it  "  Fort  Patrick  Henry." 

294 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

of  the  Revolution  "  in  the  romantic  Watauga  Valley 
had  humbled  them,  had  taken  hostages,  had  built  "  Fort 
Patrick  Henry  "  at  the  key-point  of  the  region.  So  in 
that  quarter  a  fresh  treaty  still  held;  but  Henry  was 
less  at  ease  with  respect  to  the  savages  along  the  Ohio. 
Therefore,  seeing  that  Kentucky  was  the  buffer  and  out 
post  of  the  Commonwealth,  he  was  all  readiness  to  do 
his  part.  He  gave  Clark  a  letter  to  the  Council  at  Wil- 
liamsburg,  and  soon  wagons  with  five  hundred  pounds 
of  powder  were  on  the  way  West.  That  some  of  the 
Council  at  first  demurred  about  sending  the  supply  is 
in  no  wise  to  the  discredit  of  this  watchful  board.  A 
great  land-ownership  dispute  was  pending,  and  not  until 
later  was  it  settled  that  Kentucky  belonged  to  the  State 
itself  rather  than  to  Richard  Henderson,  who  claimed 
it  on  the  strength  of  Indian  purchases.  All  the  old  land 
companies  lost  their  Indian  lands  finally,  but  throughout 
Henry's  early  years  in  the  executive  chair  they  gave  rise 
to  much  perplexity.  Meantime,  Clark's  heart  was  won, 
Kentucky  County  was  set  off  from  Fincastle,  and  the 
first  step  had  been  taken  in  an  exceedingly  large  matter. 
It  was  larger,  no  doubt,  than  Henry  at  first  conceived. 
In  December,  1777,  Clark  reappeared  at  Williamsburg. 
It  looked  now  as  if  the  worst  of  the  Revolution  were 
over,  as  if  by  blood  and  sweat  the  patriots  would 
reach  the  hill-top  and  see  the  broad  republic  down  below 
— fertile  bottoms,  forests,  innumerable  places  for  peace 
ful  homes.  Perhaps  Clark  saw  more.  Perhaps  he  saw 
the  prairies  beyond  the  forests.  At  any  rate,  he  at  once 
interested  Jefferson,  Wythe,  and  Mason  in  a  bold  plan 
that  had  come  into  his  head.  On  the  morning  of  the 
loth  of  December  the  plan  was  submitted  to  Henry.  It 
was  Clark's  own  idea  of  the  one  true  way  to  defend 
the  far-stretching  borderland  from  the  Lakes  to  the 
Cherokee  Mountains.  He  said  that  the  chief  menace 
in  the  West  was  the  chain  of  British  forts  that  stretched 

295 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

from  Lake  Huron  to  the  Mississippi — from  Detroit  to 
Kaskaskia.  Out  of  these,  as  from  hatching-places,  sav 
age  enemies  might  sally  at  any  time.  Governor  Ham 
ilton  at  Detroit  might  give  the  word  when  it  pleased 
him  to  do  so,  and  then  might  come  such  a  tempest  as 
that  which  had  just  swept  the  Wyoming  Valley.  The 
way  to  defend  Virginia  was  to  make  Hamilton  defend 
Detroit.  Would  the  gentlemen  help  him? 

Clark  had  willing  listeners.  It  will  not  do  to  say  that 
possibly  some  of  them  saw  further  in  the  matter  than 
he  did  himself ;  but  as  the  four  men  to  whom  he  talked 
were  veterans  in  statecraft,  it  may  have  been  so.  The 
historical  painter  certainly  has  a  remarkable  group  here 
— Clark,  Jefferson,  Mason,  Wythe,  Henry.  When  they 
put  their  heads  together  for  the  conquest  of  the  Illinois 
country,  there  was  as  notable  a  conjunction  as  one  often 
reads  about,  and  it  was  over  a  matter  of  magnitude. 
They  cooperated  zealously.  That  very  morning  the 
Governor  sent  a  letter  to  the  Legislature.  It  was  neces 
sary  to  be  secret.  But  if  the  letter  seemed  enigmatical, 
Jefferson,  Mason,  and  Wythe  were  on  the  spot  to  push 
through  the  necessary  bill — which  they  did.  Clark  was 
authorized  to  execute  his  plan,  and  the  State  agreed  to 
supply  him  with  men  and  money.  Henry's  instructions 
to  Clark,  as  issued  through  the  Privy  Council,  have  been 
praised  for  their  humanity.  Butler,  in  his  "  History  of 
Kentucky,"  declares  that  "  they  form  a  monument  of 
durable  glory  in  the  Revolutionary  annals  of  our  parent 
State/'  And  Americans  will  never  be  done  glorifying 
the  achievements  of  Clark.  He  started  down  the  Ohio 
in  May ;  captured  Kaskaskia,  Vincennes,  and  other  posts ; 
broke  the  British  power  in  the  North-west,  and  sent 
Hamilton  a  prisoner  to  Williamsburg.  With  his  hun 
dred  and  eighty  riflemen,  he  passed  through  great 
danger  and  hardship.  Henry's  letter  to  the  Virginia 
delegates  in  Congress  and  a  subsequent  letter  to  Gen- 

296 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

eral  Washington  on  the  subject  of  the  conquest  show 
no  undue  elation;  but  beyond  doubt  he  was  happy  in 
the  feeling  that  much  of  the  glory  belonged  to  Virginia 
as  a  State,  and  perhaps  some  to  him  and  his  advisers. 
"  That  country  was  ours,"  declared  John  Randolph, 
"  by  a  double  title — by  charter  and  by  conquest."  Ran 
dolph  spoke  of  Clark  as  "  the  Hannibal  of  the  West," 
and  with  that  fondness  for  classic  comparisons  which 
pleased  the  taste  of  his  own  generation,  but  offends  that 
of  ours,  likened  Clark's  heroes,  when  in  wintry  weather 
they  waded  up  to  their  breasts  through  the  "  drowned 
lands  of  the  Wabash,"  to  Hannibal's  soldiers  crossing 
the  Thrasymene  marsh.  But,  as  Randall  points  out, 
Clark  was  more  heroic  than  Hannibal,  who  had  one 
elephant  left  on  which  to  ride  without  getting  wet, 
whereas  Clark  was  on  foot.  All  of  which  would  have 
amused  the  hardy  followers  of  the  matter-of-fact  Clark, 
just  as  it  amuses  the  people  who  read  the  comparison 
to-day.  It  is  the  incongruity  that  makes  us  shake  our 
heads.  It  is  the  feeling  that  the  sense  of  proportion  is 
violated.  We  want  no  Hannibal  in  mind  when  we  think 
of  the  pluck  of  our  grandfathers,  who  waded  for  five 
days  in  icy  water  that  they  might  seize  the  key  to  a 
vast  region,  which  was  to  become  the  home  of  a  teeming 
population,  with  no  king  or  conqueror  within  the  con 
tinental  bounds. 

Before  turning  away  from  the  subject  of  the  North 
west  Territory,  let  us  note  two  great  sequential  events 
of  the  time.  Virginia  saw  that  France  hesitated  to 
confirm  the  alliance  with  America  because  all  the  States 
had  not  adopted  the  Articles  of  Confederation.  Mary 
land  hung  back,  on  the  contention  that  the  other  States 
possessing  Western  territory  must  first  cede  it  to  the 
Union.  To  seal  the  Union,  Virginia  gave  up  the  land — 
an  act  of  patriotism,  at  least,  if  not  of  magnanimity. 
Again,  when,  by  the  ordinance  of  1787,  slavery  was 

297 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

forever  excluded  from  the  North-west  Territory,  it  was 
to  the  credit  of  the  people  of  Henry's  State  that  they 
said  "  Amen !  " 

Whatever  the  errors  of  his  administration,  it  is  plain 
that  Patrick  Henry  was  a  vigilant  and  hard-working 
Governor.  A  less  circumspect  executive,  for  instance, 
might  have  neglected  to  police  "  the  back  settlements  " ; 
but  Henry  was  ever  watchful  of  them.  Just  before  the 
close  of  his  administration,  he  sent  a  band  of  "  over- 
mountain  men  "  under  Colonel  Evan  Shelby  to  chastise 
the  Cherokees.  Thus  the  foes  on  the  border  were 
cowed  and  kept  so;  and  when  the  time  came  for  the 
frontiersmen  to  concentrate  in  an  exigent  crisis,  they 
were  ready.  King's  Mountain  was  the  place  where 
they  finally  cut  their  names  in  rock  that  bids  fair  to  last 
for  ages. 

As  Henry  was  the  first  of  the  Commonwealth  Gov 
ernors,  many  Virginia  precedents  were  set  by  him.  He 
was  first  to  use  the  expression  "  fellow-citizens."  He 
was  first  to  exercise  enlarged  powers.  He  was  probably 
first  to  encounter  a  difficulty  between  the  Federal  and 
State  authorities — General  Hand  of  the  Continental 
service  having  taken  it  upon  himself  to  order  up  Vir 
ginia  militia  to  join  him  at  Pittsburg.  But  apparently 
the  precedents  and  difficulties  were  well  considered. 
The  Executive  Council,  which  Madison  joined  on  Jan 
uary  14,  1778,  was  equal  to  its  duties.  Henry  deferred 
to  the  board,  preserved  its  harmony,  and  utilized  it  in 
improving  the  machinery  of  government.  It  was  held 
by  some  of  Henry's  close  adherents  that  he  was  entitled 
to  another  term.  They  said  that  when  he  was  first 
chosen,  it  was  by  the  Fifth  Convention  and  not  by  the 
Legislature.  This  was  a  quibble,  and  Henry  would 
have  none  of  it.  On  May  28,  1779,  he  notified  the 
Assembly  of  his  purpose  to  retire;  and  on  June  i 
Thomas  Jefferson  succeeded  him. 

298 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

Jefferson  expected  a  great  deal  of  himself  as  Gover 
nor  of  Virginia.  His  friends  also  looked  to  see  him 
bring  honor  upon  himself.  He  was  thirty-six,  and  a 
growing  man.  But,  vigorous  as  he  was  and  versatile 
as  he  was,  he  had  little  military  outlook.  He  was  essen 
tially  a  civilian.  Do  we  need  to  remind  ourselves  of  our 
unpreparedness  for  war  when  he  left  the  White  House  ? 
Obviously,  he  was  a  practical  philosopher,  a  law-giver, 
a  great  politician ;  but  he  was  undeveloped  on  the  fight 
ing  side.  When  he  became  Governor,  he  was  intent 
upon  liberalizing  the  laws,  and  it  is  likely  that  he  thought 
too  much  upon  this  matter  and  too  little  upon  the  real 
problem  before  him.  Thus  it  happened  that  when  he 
retired  at  the  end  of  his  second  term,  he  was  humiliated 
— mortified  beyond  measure. 

In  fairness  to  Jefferson,  it  should  be  said  that  both  the 
wind  and  the  tide  of  war  were  against  him.  We  have 
seen  that  Virginia's  commissarial  service  had  been  im 
mense.  She  had  long  been  "  a  nursery  of  raw  soldiers, 
horses,  and  provisions  "  for  the  Northern  and  Southern 
armies.  So,  when  she  herself  was  struck,  much  of  her 
strength  was  gone.  With  some  ten  thousand  men  in 
the  Continental  service,  she  was  unable  to  find  guns  for 
the  home  guard.  There  was  a  factory  at  Falmouth, 
but  it  was  inadequate.  At  the  outset  of  the  war  armories 
and  arsenals  should  have  been  built  and  gunsmiths 
brought  over  from  Europe.  Now  it  was  too  late ;  and 
even  if  there  had  been  time  to  organize  and  equip  a 
standing  army,  it  would  not  have  been  done.  We  recall 
Landon  Carter's  criticism  of  Henry,  who  did  not  take 
counsel  of  his  "  fears  "  at  all  when  he  tried  to  strengthen 
the  State  soldiery,  but  of  his  common  sense.  The  fact 
is  that  about  the  time  Henry  stepped  out  and  Jefferson 
in,  the  people  became  apathetic.  "  The  French 
Alliance,"  says  Henry  S.  Randall,  "  without  yet  intro 
ducing  into  the  country  anything  like  a  counterpoise  to 

299 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

the  British  strength,  had  infused  a  fatal  security  into 
the  public  mind."  Enlistments  were  difficult.  The 
Legislature  reflected  the  public  feeling.  As  for  Wash 
ington,  Henry,  and  other  leaders,  they  were  far  more 
despondent  during  this  period  than  they  had  ever  been 
before.  In  a  letter  to  Mason,  Henry  said : 

"I  view  things  very  differently,  I  fear,  from  what  people 
in  general  do.  I  have  seen  without  despondency  (even  for  a 
moment)  the  hours  which  America  has  styled  her  gloomy  ones, 
but  I  have  beheld  no  day  since  the  commencement  of  hostilities 
that  I  have  thought  her  liberties  in  such  imminent  danger  as 
at  present.  Friends  and  foes  seem  now  to  combine  to  pull 
down  the  goodly  fabric  we  have  hitherto  been  raising  at  the 
expense  of  so  much  time,  blood,  and  treasure — and  unless  the 
bodies  politic  will  exert  themselves  to  bring  things  back  to 
first  principles,  correct  abuses,  and  punish  our  internal  foes, 
inevitable  ruin  must  follow.  Indeed,  we  seem  to  be  verging 
so  fast  to  destruction,  that  I  am  filled  with  sensations  to 
which  I  have  been  a  stranger  till  within  these  three  months. 
Our  enemy  behold  with  exultation  and  joy  how  effectually 
we  labor  for  their  benefit,  and  from  being  in  a  state  of  absolute 
despair,  and  on  the  point  of  evacuating  America,  are  now  on 
tiptoe." 

He  concludes  that  Spain  must  intervene  or  affairs 
will  be  still  worse.  It  is  true  that  Henry  was  low- 
spirited  on  account  of  sickness,  but  his  head  was  clear. 
He  wrote  to  Jefferson,  confessing  his  "  anxieties  for  our 
Commonwealth."  "  Tell  me,"  he  asked,  "  do  you  re 
member  any  instance  where  tyranny  was  destroyed,  and 
freedom  established  on  its  ruins,  among  a  people  pos 
sessing  so  small  a  share  of  virtue  and  public  spirit? 
I  recollect  none ;  and  this,  more  than  the  British  arms, 
makes  me  fearful  of  final  success,  without  a  reform." 
Henry  was  rather  close  to  his  Tacitus  here — "  a  people 
without  morals  may  acquire  liberty,  but  without  morals 
they  cannot  preserve  it." 

But  the  Revolution  was  soon  to  rekindle  in  Virginia, 
300 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

and  she  herself  was  to  feel  the  scourge  of  war.  Let  us 
recall  the  facts  of  the  general  situation.  The  war  was 
now  world-wide.  England  was  fighting  in  both  hemi 
spheres  and  on  almost  all  the  seas.  Of  her  314,000 
soldiers,  she  could  spare  no  more  armies  of  the  size  of 
Burgoyne's  to  conduct  the  operations  that  would  be 
necessary  to  checkmate  and  overpower  Washington. 
France  was  active  on  land  and  sea.  Spain,  sure  enough, 
as  Henry  had  hoped,  declared  war,  seeking  to  reacquire 
Gibraltar  and  the  Floridas.  There  was  bloody  turmoil 
in  India.  So  it  was  decided  by  Lord  George  Germain 
to  overrun  Georgia,  the  Garolinas,  and  Virginia — to  wear 
the  "  rebels  "  out  with  raids  and  ruination.  Hence  the 
change  in  the  course  and  character  of  the  war.  It 
swung  South.  It  became  more  ferocious.  Arnold,  with 
twenty-seven  sail,  passed  in  between  the  Capes  in  Jan 
uary,  1781 ;  Phillips,  whom  Jefferson  called  "  the  proud 
est  man  of  the  proudest  nation  on  earth/'  appeared 
in  March;  Cornwallis,  in  May.  And  why  Cornwallis, 
who  by  rights  was  Greene's  foe?  Greene  had  done  a 
most  amazing  thing.  After  his  battle  with  Cornwallis, 
he  had  kept  on  South,  reconquering  the  Carolinas.  It 
was  winning  strategy,  but  Virginia  became  the  sacrifice. 
Out  of  the  North  Lafayette  hurried ;  then  Wayne ;  then 
Washington.  But  meantime  terrible  things  happened 
in  Virginia,  and  piquantly  funny  things  as  well.  We 
come,  indeed,  to  a  tragicomedy  of  the  Revolution- — the 
great  Tarleton  drama,  preceding  Yorktown.  The  trag 
edy  is  found  in  the  British  depredations.  His  Lordship, 
Cornwallis,  is  said  to  have  pocketed  silver  plate.  But 
this  would  have  been  as  nothing  if  he  had  not  permitted 
houses  to  be  burned  and  plantations  swept  of  their  slaves 
and  stock.  The  throats  of  colts  were  cut.  Of  the  thirty 
thousand  black  people  carried  off,  twenty-seven  thousand 
are  estimated  to  have  died  of  small-pox  and  camp  fever. 
The  devastations  amounted  to  three  millions  sterling. 

301 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

At  this  period  Henry  lived  in  the  county  that  bore 
his  own  name,  representing  it  in  the  Assembly.  Early 
in  the  year  General  Greene,  then  on  the  Dan,  had  written 
to  Jefferson :  "  Our  force  is  so  inferior  that  every  exer 
tion  in  the  State  of  Virginia  is  necessary  to  support  us. 
I  have  taken  the  liberty  to  write  to  Mr.  Henry  to  collect 
fourteen  or  fifteen  hundred  volunteers  to  aid  us."  Ap 
parently  Henry  exerted  himself,  for  in  a  little  while 
great  numbers  of  militia-men  gathered  on  the  north  bank 
of  the  Dan.  They  saw  Greene  march  away,  however, 
and  within  a  few  weeks  Henry  heard  of  the  Cornwallis 
invasion.  Grigsby  puzzles  us  somewhat  when  he  says : 

"  Of  all  men  of  the  Revolution,  Patrick  Henry  displayed  the 
greatest  spirit  .  .  .  yet  so  deeply  impressed  was  he  with  the 
peril  of  the  period  that,  when  Greene  had  reached  Halifax 
old  Court-house  in  his  retreat  before  Cornwallis,  and  when 
Cornwallis  himself  was  on  the  banks  of  the  Dan  waiting  a 
fall  of  water,  instead  of  haranguing  the  people  of  Henry,  where 
he  then  was,  and  marching  with  the  levy  of  his  county  en 
masse  to  harass  the  foe,  fearing  lest  he  might  be  captured  by 
the  scouting  parties  of  the  enemy,  he  hastened  from  the 
scene  of  war  to  Hanover.  An  honorable  death  in  a  fair  field 
he  did  not  dread,  but  he  dreaded  an  ignominious  death  on  the 
scaffold  or  from  a  tree.  The  intercepted  letter  of  Cornwallis 
to  Nisbett  Balfour,  dictated  on  the  spur  of  a  momentary  tri 
umph,  proves  incontestably  that  the  success  of  the  British  would 
have  been  written  in  the  blood  of  the  purest  and  greatest 
men  of  whom  our  country  could  boast." 

Henry  had  reason  to  suspect  that  he  would  be  hanged 
if  taken,  and  he  had  no  idea  of  riding  into  the  arms 
of  the  British  dragoons.  His  uncle,  Anthony  Winston, 
of  Buckingham,  had  an  indentured  servant.  Peter  Fran 
cisco,  who  put  nine  of  them  to  flight  in  an  encounter 
of  glorious  record  in  the  school-books ;  but  Henry  was 
less  Samsonian  and  less  eager  to  distinguish  himself. 
Nevertheless,  he  did  all  he  could  in  the  emergency. 
Even  if  he  failed  to  "  harangue  "  the  Henry  County 

302 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

militia-men,  we  know  from  the  Calendar  of  Virginia 
State  Papers  that  they  joined  Greene  "  in  greater  num 
bers  than  called  for  " ;  and  it  is  probable  that  Henry 
left  home,  not  for  Hanover,  but  for  Richmond,  where 
the  Legislature  was  about  to  meet  in  extra  session — 
when  Cornwallis  came  knocking  at  the  door.  Congress 
had  run  away  from  Philadelphia  twice — to  Baltimore  in 
1776,  and  to  York  in  1777.  Legislatures  had  repeatedly 
changed  capitals.  So  the  Virginia  Assembly,  Henry 
accompanying,  rode  up  to  Charlottesville. 

Jefferson,  meantime,  was  powerless.  He  is  said  to 
have  ridden  his  horse  to  death  in  his  efforts  to  protect 
the  public  stores.  If  so,  he  was  soon  astride  of  another 
and  away  for  Monticello.  Now,  Banastre  Tarleton, 
Cornwallis'  "hunting  leopard,  glossy,  beautifully  mot 
tled,  but  swift  and  fell,"  had  it  in  mind  to  come  up  with 
Jefferson,  Henry,  and  other  gentlemen  of  like  politics. 
Therefore  he,  too,  struck  north  for  Albernarle,  riding  at 
the  head  of  his  dragoons,  whose  white  uniforms  faced 
with  green  caught  many  an  eye  peering  forth  from 
roadside  houses.  One  pair  of  eyes  belonged  to  Captain 
John  Jouette,  who  was  at  the  Cuckoo  Tavern  in  Henry's 
old  county  of  Louisa.  Jouette,  in  scarlet  coat  and  hat 
with  waving  plume,  soon  sped  away  on  a  blooded  horse 
— likewise  making  for  Charlottesville.  But  he  took  a 
"  disused  and  shorter  route,"  cut  around  Tarleton, 
stopped  to  see  Jefferson  at  Monticello,  and  reached 
the  objective  point  in  time  to  warn  the  Assembly,  which 
adjourned  to  Staunton,  in  the  Shenandoah  Valley.  We 
are  glad  to  set  it  down  that  the  honorable  members 
"  breakfasted  at  leisure  "  before  departing  for  the  Blue 
Ridge. 

As  we  follow  Tarleton — who  on  this  raid,  upon  a 
sudden  alarm,  sprang  into  his  saddle  with  one  cheek 
fresh-shaved  and  the  other  lathered — we  come  upon 
some  former  friends  of  ours,  namely,  Judge  Peter  Lyons, 

303 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

he.  '  They  here  ?  Well,  I  never  would  have  thought  it,'  and  she 
stood  a  moment  as  if  in  doubt,  but  finally  added,  '  No  matter ; 
we  love  those  gentlemen,  and  I  didn't  suppose  they  would  ever 
run  from  the  British,  but  since  they  have,  they  shall  have  noth 
ing  to  eat  in  my  house.  You  may  ride  along.'  As  a  last  resort, 
Mr.  Tyler  then  stepped  forward,  and  said,  '  What  would  you 
say,  my  good  woman,  if  I  were  to  tell  you  that  Patrick  Henry 
fled  with  the  rest  of  us  ?  '  *  Patrick  Henry !  I  would  tell  you 
there  was  n't  a  word  01  truth  in  it,'  she  answered  angrily ; 
'  Patrick  Henry  would  never  do  such  a  cowardly  thing.'  '  But 
this  is  Mr.  Henry,'  rejoined  Mr.  Tyler,  pointing  him  out.  The 
old  woman  looked  astonished.  After  a  moment's  consideration, 
and  a  twitch  or  two  at  her  apron  string  by  way  of  recovering 
her  scattered  thoughts,  she  said,  '  Well,  then,  if  that  is  Patrick 
Henry,  it  must  be  all  right.  Come  in,  and  ye  shall  have  the 
best  I  have  in  the  house.'  Perhaps  no  better  compliment  was 
ever  paid  to  the  patriotism  of  Patrick  Henry  than  this  simple 
tribute  of  praise  from  the  mouth  of  that  poor  but  noble  woman." 

Various  tales  are  told  in  the  Valley  concerning  the 
fugitives.  Colonel  William  Lewis  is  said  to  have  ex 
claimed  within  earshot  of  the  object  of  his  eulogy:  "  If 
Patrick  Henry  had  been  in  Albemarle,  the  British  dra 
goons  never  would  have  passed  the  Rivanna  River." 
Jocular  tradition  even  goes  so  far  as  to  assure  us  that 
in  a  night  alarm  at  Staunton  Henry  made  off  with  the 
other  members,  lost  one  of  his  boots,  and  blushed  to  the 
roots  of  his  wig  when  a  negro  ran  up  to  him  with  the 
missing  piece  of  foot-leather.  But  fact  sternly  checks 
tradition  here.  There  was  an  alarm ;  but  it  happened 
in  the  daytime,  on  a  Sunday,  and  the  Legislature,  in 
quiet  session,  decided  to  adjourn  to  the  Warm  Springs, 
provided  the  story  of  the  approach  of  the  dragoons 
should  be  verified.  As  the  upcoming  soldiers  proved 
to  be  Americans,  the  Assembly  continued  to  sit  at 
Staunton  until  its  work  was  done. 

We  have  seen  that  Henry  was  prone  to  do  his  public 
duty,  whether  he  hurt  the  feelings  of  people  or  not. 
He  had  suffered,  we  think,  because  of  his  treatment  of 

306 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

Carter  Braxton ;  and  he  was  to  suffer  infinitely  more  be 
cause  of  something  he  did  in  connection  with  the  humili 
ating  interregnum  then  existing.  Jefferson's  term  had 
ended  on  the  second  of  June ;  it  was  the  twelfth  of  that 
month  before  his  successor,  General  Thomas  Nelson, 
was  chosen.  Edmund  Randolph  says  : 

"  At  this  session  of  the  Assembly,  the  usual  antidote  for 
public  distress  was  resorted  to.  Two  persons  were  named  with 
acrimony  as  delinquent:  Baron  Steuben,  for  not  having  suc 
ceeded  in  protecting  the  stores  in  the  vicinity  of  Point  of 
Fork,  and  Thomas  Jefferson,  the  Governor,  at  the  time  of 
Arnold's  invasion,  as  not  having  made  some  exertions  which 
he  might  have  made  for  the  defence  of  the  country.  .  .  . 
Colonel  George  Nicholas  and  Mr.  Patrick  Henry  were  those 
who  charged  Mr.  Jefferson.  They  aimed  to  express  themselves 
with  delicacy  towards  him,  without  weakening  the  ground  on 
which  they  supposed  that  their  suspicions  would  be  found 
ultimately  to  stand.  But,  probably  without  design,  they  wounded 
by  their  measured  endeavor  to  avoid  the  infliction  of  a  wound." 

It  was  Nicholas  who  moved  "  that  at  the  next  session 
of  Assembly  an  inquiry  be  made  into  the  conduct  of 
the  Executive  of  this  State  for  the  last  twelve  months." 
But  it  was  Henry  who  got  the  blame  for  it  at  Poplar 
Forest.  From  that  time  on,  until  the  end  of  his  life, 
Jefferson  was  at  outs  with  Patrick  Henry.  There  were 
two  Henrys  in  his  mind — the  younger  Henry,  who  had 
led  the  long  battle  for  freedom,  and  the  older  Henry, 
who  had  dared  to  touch  the  raw  wound  that  tortured 
him.  This  was  the  time  of  the  genesis  of  his  bitterness. 
He  had  never  liked  it,  perhaps,  because  Henry  could 
speak  so  well,  while  he  himself  was  so  lacking  in  voice, 
and  he  had  doubtless  felt  some  chagrin  in  comparing 
Henry's  record  as  Governor  with  his  own ;  but  these 
things  would  not  have  mattered — it  was  the  Staunton 
insult  that  rankled  in  his  heart,  which  was  a  proud 
heart  indeed,  with  fine  ruffles  above  it.  Emphasis  is 
here  laid  upon  the  incident  for  the  reason  that  Jefferson 

307 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

not  only  wrote  about  Henry  after  Henry  was  dead,  but 
inspired  the  writings  of  other  men  whose  words  have 
been  repeated  in  hundreds  of  lesser  books.  Thus  we 
find  that  there  are  many  readers  to-day  who  accept  the 
overcolored  tale  as  to  a  dictatorship,  and  even  swallow 
the  moonshine  of  Taylor  as  to  Henry's  willingness  to 
give  up  the  fight  in  1781.  John  Taylor,  of  Caroline,  was 
a  blood-relative  of  Pendleton,  and  his  protege.  At  the 
age  of  74,  being  then  within  six  months  of  his  grave, 
he  told  John  Quincy  Adams  that  Henry  wished  Virginia 
to  be  the  "  first  to  submit  to  Great  Britain,  in  order  that 
she  might  obtain  the  most  favorable  terms."  Uttered 
forty-three  years  after  the  incident  alleged,  this  strange 
calumny  is  embedded  in  Adams'  diary.  People  read  it, 
and  wonder.  They  know  that  if  Henry  had  urged  such 
a  matter  in  the  House — and  Taylor  so  avers — many  men 
would  have  remembered  it.  Some  of  them  subsequently 
opposed  Henry  with  bitterness  and  rancor,  and  it  would 
have  helped  them  greatly  if  they  could  have  pointed  a 
scornful  finger  at  him.  No  one  did  so.  They  knew 
that  he  was  the  same  strong  man  and  patriot  in  1781, 
1782,  and  1783  as  in  the  preceding  years.  He  was  the 
recognized  leader.  Jefferson  himself,  referring  to  a 
measure  which  he  wished  to  introduce,  and  the  attitude 
of  the  majority,  said :  "  It  was  considered  hopeless  to  at 
tempt  it  with  such  an  opponent  at  their  head  as  Henry." 
But  if  Taylor  of  Caroline  did  not  have  so  much  as  a 
half-truth  upon  which  to  base  his  politician's  dream,  it 
must  be  said  that  there  was  usually  a  foundation  for 
the  Monticello  tales.  Girardin  caught  them  and  colored 
them  to  suit,  and  put  them  into  that  now  rare  fourth 
volume  of  Burk.  He  says  that  the  plan  was  to  "  im 
peach  "  Jefferson  in  order  to  set  Henry  up  as  Dictator. 
Now  it  is  a  fact  that  there  was  open  talk  of  a  dictatorship 
in  the  Tarleton  crisis.  Judge  Archibald  Stuart  says  that 
Henry  seconded  the  Dictator  motion  in  the  House  at 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

Staunton,  observing  that  "  it  was  immaterial  to  him 
whether  the  officer  proposed  was  called  a  Dictator,  or 
Governor  with  enlarged  powers,  or  by  any  other  name, 
yet  surely  an  officer  armed  with  such  powers  was  neces 
sary  to  restrain  the  unbridled  fury  of  a  licentious 
enemy."  But,  says  Judge  Stuart,  the  motion  that  Henry 
seconded  provided  for  the  appointment,  not  of  Patrick 
Henry,  but  of  George  Washington.  So  the  Monticello 
perversion  is  apparent  in  this  matter,  as  in  many  other 
matters  connected  with  Henry's  career. 

Henry,  for  his  part,  never  abused  Jefferson.  He 
would  not  have  prompted  the  Jefferson  inquiry  if  he 
had  not  felt  it  to  be  his  sworn  duty  to  do  so.  No  man 
was  kinder  hearted — no  man  less  envious  of  other  men 
in  the  public  service.  But  he  was  not  afraid.  As  it 
proved,  the  resolution  of  inquiry  was  superfluous. 
Nicholas  regretted  that  he  had  made  it,  apologized  to 
Jefferson,  and  became  his  ardent  follower.  The  inquiry 
was  held,  but  by  that  time  something  had  happened — 
something  that  caused  the  sun  to  burst  forth  and  shine 
from  one  end  of  America  to  the  other,  something  truly 
glorious  and  unforgettable.  Tarleton  was  trapped — 
Cornwallis — all  of  them.  It  was  Yorktown  that  lifted 
the  clouds.  The  war  was  as  good  as  over. 

And  somehow,  having  mentioned  the  big  happening, 
we  are  reminded  of  a  little  happening — a  very  little 
happening — in  the  woods  near  Yorktown.  It  was  a  re 
tired  spot,  and  there  were  two  persons  present — General 
Washington  and  "  Pete,"  his  servant.  The  General 
swished  air  with  his  horsewhip,  and  "  Pete "  danced. 
It  was  no  legislative  inquiry;  nevertheless,  it  was  an 
inquiry.  It  was  as  if  the  great  man  had  said :  "  Now, 
you  rascal !  It's  your  turn.  For  seven  long  years  have 
I  busied  myself  in  bloody  contention.  I  have  marched, 
I  have  fought,  I  have  beaten  the  haughtiest  of  human 
kind — and  now,  sir,  I'm  going  to  gad  you!" 

309 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

And  with  this  realistic  bit,  if  we  were  a  humorist, 
might  we  end  the  Revolutionary  War.  But  in  truth 
it  had  been  a  sad  and  cruel  and  most  exhausting  war. 
Not  long  after  Appomattox,  some  one  at  the  Virginia 
Springs  made  note  of  a  strange  sight  in  a  ballroom. 
On  the  floor  there  was  no  lack  of  beautiful  women,  but 
they  danced  without  partners.  Against  the  walls  sat  a 
few  men — all  maimed.  So,  too,  when  the  Chevalier  de 
Chastellux  travelled  through  Virginia,  after  the  surren 
der  of  Cornwallis,  he  observed  great  numbers  of  men 
who  had  suffered  grievous  wounds.  The  actual  hard 
ship  of  those  heroic  times  is  apt  to  be  glanced  over  and 
forgotten,  as  we  search  the  records  for  the  pleasing, 
the  romantic,  or  the  glorious. 

Before  the  French  soldiers  scattered  their  silver  broad 
cast  in  Virginia,  there  had  been  a  long  coin  famine. 
Boys  "  able  to  shoulder  a  musket  had  never  seen  a 
guinea."  Paper  money  was  worth  little,  and  trade  was 
out  of  joint.  A  great  number  of  legislative  enactments 
bearing  upon  matters  sequential  to  the  war  or  to  the 
change  in  government  were  needed  ;  and  Henry  brought 
forward  and  pushed  through  some  of  the  most  im 
portant  of  the  bills.  Hening's  "  Statutes  "  and  the  Vir 
ginia  Legislative  Records  set  forth  in  detail  these 
various  measures.  Twice  a  year,  in  the  spring  and  in 
the  fall,  Henry  rode  up  to  Richmond  from  his  new 
home  down  near  the  North  Carolina  line,  and  took  his 
place  as  leader  in  the  House.  His  chief  enemy,  it  seems, 
was  one  of  his  best  friends — Richard  Henry  Lee.  They 
got  along  well  in  private,  but  frequently  differed  in  the 
Assembly.  Judge  Roane,  himself  a  member,  tells  us 
that  "  Henry  was  almost  always  victorious  over  Lee." 
He  adds :  "  I  once  heard  Mr.  Lee  say  in  a  pet,  after 
sustaining  a  great  defeat,  that  if  the  votes  were  weighed 
instead  of  being  counted,  he  would  not  have  lost  it." 
And  again  Roane  says :  "  As  an  orator  Mr.  Henry 

310 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

demolished  Madison  with  as  much  ease  as  Samson  did 
the  cords  that  bound  him  before  he  was  shorn." 

But  as  Judge  Roane's  memorandum  with  respect  to 
Henry  is  illuminating  throughout,  it  is  better  to  print 
what  he  says,  word  for  word;  and  accordingly  we  do 
so  in  an  appendix  to  this  volume.  Though  Henry  "  de 
molished  "  Madison,  there  is  reason  to  believe  that  the 
elder  statesman  gave  his  hand  most  heartily  to  such' 
rising  juniors  as  Breckenridge,  who  became  Attorney- 
General,  Grayson,  who  figured  conspicuously  as  United 
States  Senator,  and  Marshall,  who  won  the  high  regard 
of  all  as  Chief- Justice  of  the  Supreme  Court.  Indeed, 
Lee  and  Henry  needed  the  help  of  the  younger  men. 
Mason,  who  never  liked  to  quit  his  congenial  home 
work  on  the  Potomac  shore,  wrote  to  Henry : 

"  I  congratulate  you,  most  sincerely,  on  the  accomplish 
ment  of  what  I  know  was  the  warmest  wish  of  your  heart, 
the  establishment  of  American  independence  and  the  liberty 
of  our  country.  We  are  now  to  rank  among  the  nations  of  the 
world;  but  whether  our  independence  shall  prove  a  blessing 
or  a  curse,  must  depend  upon  our  own  wisdom  or  folly,  virtue 
or  wickedness.  Judging  of  the  future  from  the  past,  the 
prospect  is  not  promising.  Justice  and  virtue  are  the  vital 
principles  of  republican  government;  but  among  us  a  depravity 
of  manners  and  morals  prevails,  to  the  destruction  of  all 
confidence  between  man  and  man.  It  greatly  behooves  the 
Assembly  to  revise  several  of  our  laws,  and  to  abolish  all  such 
as  are  contrary  to  the  fundamental  principles  of  justice.  .  .  . 
It  is  in  your  power,  my  dear  sir,  to  do  more  good  and  prevent 
more  mischief  than  any  man  in  this  State;  and  I  doubt  not 
that  you  will  exert  the  great  talents  with  which  God  has  blessed 
you,  in  promoting  the  public  happiness  and  prosperity." 

"  To  prevent  mischief  and  to  do  good  "  seems  to  have 
been  Henry's  motto  all  through  this  period  of  his  public 
service.  He  thought  out  the  knotty  and  pressing 
problems  of  the  time,  and,  wherever  it  was  practical, 
drew  up  and  pushed  through  the  necessary  bills.  Many 

311 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

of  these  were  remedial,  such  as  the  funding  measure  and 
the  bill  for  adjusting  debts  and  contracts.  Others  were 
in  the  interest  of  education,  and  to  further  various  inter 
nal  improvements.  He  was  especially  interested  in  the 
establishment  of  Hampden-Sidney  College,  and  is  cred 
ited  with  the  stipulation  in  its  charter  that  none  should 
be  teachers  there  save  those  with  a  u  sincere  affection 
for  the  liberty  and  independence  of  the  United  States." 

Critics  of  Henry's  career,  seeking  to  hold  him  to  the 
line  of  his  avowed  principles,  point  to  his  support  of  the 
general  assessment  bill  as  a  departure  from  the  course 
marked  out  by  his  own  beacons.  The  bill  proposed  to 
support  religious  teachers  by  taxation.  How  could 
Henry,  a  pioneer  in  advocacy  of  religious  freedom, 
countenance  such  a  measure?  But  there  is  a  world  of 
difference  between  Henry's  championship  of  religious 
liberty  and  his  championship  of  religion  itself.  The 
war  had  left  wickedness  in  its  trail — great  wickedness 
and  demoralization.  Moreover,  Rousseau  had  sent  his 
ideas  across  the  ocean,  and  certain  forehints  of  an 
atheistic  world-wave  had  alarmed  Henry,  who  had  pro 
found  faith  and  reverence.  He  was  a  religious  man  in 
the  unconventional  sense.  He  meant  to  favor  no  par 
ticular  sect,  but  to  aid  every  incorporated  religious  body 
in  Virginia.  He  felt  that  society  is  based  upon  sound 
morals,  and  that  without  the  churches  decay  would  come, 
and  ruin. 

Of  the  speeches  made  by  Henry  during  this  period, 
three  were  particularly  forcible  and  picturesque.  He 
wished  to  do  away  with  all  restraints  on  British  com 
merce.  Judge  Tyler  spoke  in  opposition  to  any  change. 
"  In  reply,"  says  Tyler,  "  he  was  beyond  all  expression 
eloquent  and  sublime.  After  painting  the  distress  of 
the  people,  struggling  through  a  perilous  war,  cut  off 
from  commerce  so  long  that  they  were  naked  and  un 
clothed,  he  concluded  with  a  figure,  or  rather  with  a' 

312 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

series  of  figures,  which  I  shall  never  forget,  because, 
beautiful  as  they  were  in  themselves,  their  effect  was 
heightened  beyond  all  description  by  the  manner  in 
which  he  acted  what  he  spoke.  '  Why/  said  he,  '  should 
we  fetter  commerce?  If  a  man  is  in  chains,  he  droops 
and  bows  to  the  earth,  for  his  spirits  are  broken  (look 
ing  sorrowfully  at  his  feet)  ;  but  let  him  twist  the  fetters 
from  his  legs,  and  he  will  stand  erect,' — straightening 
himself,  and  assuming  a  look  of  proud  defiance.  '  Fetter 
not  commerce,  sir — let  her  be  as  free  as  the  air — she 
will  range  the  whole  creation,  and  return  on  the  wings 
of  the  four  winds  of  heaven  to  bless  the  land  with 
plenty/  ' 

Tyler,  a  sincere  man  of  fiery  nature — very  able,  very 
patriotic — also  opposed  Henry  in  the  matter  of  the  return 
of  the  Tories.  Henry  advocated  their  restoration  to 
citizenship.  He  said : 

"  We  have,  sir,  an  extensive  country  without  population — 
what  can  be  more  obvious  policy  than  that  this  country  ought 
to  be  populated?  People,  sir,  constitute  the  strength  and 
form  the  wealth  of  a  nation.  I  want  to  see  our  vast  forests 
filled  up  by  a  process  a  little  more  speedy  than  the  ordinary 
course  of  nature.  I  wish  to  see  these  States  rapidly  ascend 
ing  to  the  rank  which  their  natural  advantages  authorize  them 
to  hold  among  the  nations  of  the  earth.  Cast  your  eye,  sir, 
over  this  extensive  country — observe  the  salubrity  of  your 
climate,  the  variety  and  fertility  of  your  soil — and  see  that 
soil  intersected  in  every  quarter  by  bold,  navigable  streams, 
flowing  to  the  east  and  to  the  west,  as  if  the  finger  of  heaven 
were  marking  out  the  course  of  your  settlements,  inviting  you 
to  enterprise,  and  pointing  the  way  to  wealth.  Sir,  you  are 
destined,  at  some  time  or  other,  to  become  a  great  agricultural 
and  commercial  people;  the  only  question  is  whether  you 
choose  to  reach  this  point  by  slow  gradations,  and  at  some 
distant  period — lingering  on  through  a  long  and  sickly  minority 
— subjected,  meanwhile,  to  machinations,  insults,  and  oppres 
sions  of  enemies,  foreign  and  domestic,  without  sufficient 
strength  to  resist  and  chastise  them — or  whether  you  choose 
to  rush  at  once,  as  it  were,  to  the  full  enjoyment  of  those 

313 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

high  destinies,  and  be  able  to  cope,  single-handed,  with  the 
proudest  oppressors  of  the  old  world.  If  you  prefer  the 
latter  course,  as  I  trust  you  do,  encourage  the  husbandmen, 
the  mechanics,  the  merchants  of  the  old  world  to  come  and 
settle  in  this  land  of  promise — make  it  the  home  of  the  skilful, 
the  industrious,  the  fortunate,  the  happy,  as  well  as  the  asylum 
of  the  distressed.  .  .  .  But,  sir,  you  must  have  men.  .  .  . 
Do  you  ask  how  you  are  to  get  them?  Open  your  doors, 
sir,  and  they  will  come  in.  ...  Sir,  they  are  already  stand 
ing  on  tiptoe  upon  their  native  shores,  and  looking  to  your 
coasts  with  a  wistful  and  longing  eye.  .  .  .  They  see  a 
land  in  which  liberty  hath  taken  up  her  abode  .  .  .  her 
altars  rising  .  .  .  her  glories  chanted.  .  .  .  But  gentle 
men  object  to  any  accession  from  Great  Britain,  and  particu 
larly  to  the  return  of  British  refugees.  .  .  .  Let  us  have  the 
magnanimity,  sir,  to  lay  aside  our  antipathies  and  prejudices. 
.  .  .  I  have  no  fear  of  any  mischief  that  they  can  do  us. 
Afraid  of  them !  What,  sir,  shall  we,  who  have  laid  the  proud 
British  lion  at  our  feet,  now  be  afraid  of  his  whelps?  " 

William  Wirt  tells  us  that  Chancellor  Wythe  was  so 
delighted  with  the  lion-and-whelp  passage  in  this  power 
ful  speech  that  he  got  into  the  habit  of  quoting  it  to 
his  law  class  at  William  and  Mary  College. 

Henry  triumphed  in  this  instance,  as  on  many  other 
occasions.  One  of  his  devices  was  oratorical  drollery. 
Tyler,  then  Speaker,  and  a  large  number  of  influential 
delegates  wished  to  lay  taxes  "  commensurate  with  all 
the  public  demands."  Henry  thought  that  a  people 
so  lately  war-ridden  should  be  exempted  from  taxation 
as  long  as  possible.  Judge  Archibald  Stuart,  who  was 
present,  tells  of  the  scene  when  the  Tyler  party,  having 
overcome  Henry  in  Committee  of  the  Whole,  brought  in 
their  bill.  Judge  Stuart  says: 

"  Mr.  Henry,  who  had  been  excited  and  roused  by  his  recent 
defeat,  came  forward  again  in  all  the  majesty  of  his  power. 
For  some  time  after  he  commenced  speaking,  the  countenances 
of  his  opponents  indicated  no  apprehensions  of  danger  to 
their  cause.  The  feelings  of  Mr.  Tyler,  which  were  sometimes 
warm,  could  not  on  that  occasion  be  concealed,  even  in  the 

314 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

chair.  His  countenance  was  forbidding,  even  repulsive,  and 
his  face  turned  from  the  speaker.  Mr.  Tazewell  was  reading 
a  pamphlet ;  and  Mr.  Page  was  more  than  usually  grave.  After 
some  time,  however,  it  was  discovered  that  Mr.  Tyler's  coun 
tenance  gradually  began  to  relax ;  he  would  occasionally  look 
at  Mr.  Henry;  sometimes  smile;  his  attention  by  degrees 
became  more  fixed ;  at  length  it  became  completely  so : — he 
next  appeared  to  be  in  good  humor;  he  leaned  towards  Mr. 
Henry — appeared  charmed  and  delighted,  and  finally  lost  in 
wonder  and  amazement.  The  progress  of  these  feelings  was 
legible  in  his  countenance. 

"  Mr.  Henry  drew  a  most  affecting  picture  of  the  state  of 
poverty  and  suffering  in  which  the  people  of  the  upper  counties 
had  been  left  by  the  war.  His  delineations  of  their  wants 
and  wretchedness  were  so  minute,  so  full  of  feeling,  and  withal 
so  true,  that  he  could  scarcely  fail  to  enlist  on  his  side  every 
sympathetic  mind.  He  contrasted  the  severe  toil  by  .  which 
they  had  to  gain  their  daily  subsistence  with  the  facilities  en 
joyed  by  the  people  of  the  lower  counties.  The  latter,  he  said, 
residing  on  the  salt  rivers  and  creeks,  could  draw  their  sup 
plies  at  pleasure  from  the  waters  that  flowed  by  their  doors ; 
and  then  he  presented  such  a  ludicrous  image  of  the  members 
who  had  advocated  the  bill  (the  most  of  whom  were  from  the 
lower  counties),  peeping  and  peering  along  the  shores  of  the 
creeks  to  pick  up  their  mess  of  crabs,  or  paddling  off  to  the 
oyster  rocks  to  rake  for  their  daily  bread,  as  filled  the  House 
with  a  roar  of  merriment.  Mr.  Tazewell  laid  down  his  pam 
phlet  and  shook  his  sides  with  laughter ;  even  the  gravity  of  Mr. 
Page  was  affected ;  a  corresponding  change  of  countenance 
prevailed  through  the  ranks  of  the  advocates  of  the  bill,  and 
you  might  discover  that  they  had  surrendered  their  cause.  In 
this  they  were  not  disappointed ;  for  on  a  division,  Mr.  Henry 
had  a  majority  of  upwards  of  thirty  against  the  bill." 

"  I  have  seen  him,"  says  Judge  Tyler,  "  reply  to  Page, 
H.  Tazewell,  R.  H.  Lee,  and  others  with  such  a  volume 
of  wit  and  humor  that  the  House  would  be  in  an  uproar 
of  laughter,  and  even  set  his  opponents  altogether  in  a 
perfect  convulsion.  But  this  talent  he  not  often  in 
dulged,  deeming  it  beneath  a  statesman." 

About  this  time,  Lee,  Henry,  and  other  members  of 
the  Legislature  spent  a  night  at  Edmund  Randolph's 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

house,  near  Richmond.  According  to  Wirt,  Lee  "  en 
tertained  the  company  to  a  very  late  hour,  descanting 
on  the  genius  of  Cervantes,  especially  as  it  was  dis 
played  in  '  Don  Quixote.'  Finally  the  company  began 
to  yawn,  but  Colonel  Lee  did  not  observe  it,  and  con 
tinued  his  remarks.  Mr.  Henry  took  in  the  situation, 
and  rising  slowly  from  his  chair  walked  across  the  room, 
remarking  that  '  Don  Quixote  '  was  certainly  a  most 
excellent  work,  and  most  skilfully  adapted  to  the  pur 
pose  of  the  author ;  '  but/  said  he,  '  Mr.  Lee,'  stopping 
before  him  with  a  most  significant  archness  of  look,  '  you 
have  overlooked,  in  your  eulogy,  one  of  the  finest  things 
in  the  work.'  '  What  is  that  ?  '  asked  Lee.  '  It  is,'  said 
Mr.  Henry,  '  that  divine  exclamation  of  Sancho : 
"  Blessed  be  the  man  that  first  invented  sleep ;  it  covers 
one  all  over  like  a  cloak."  Mr.  Lee  took  the  hint,  and 
the  company  broke  up  in  good  humor." 

Henry  again  became  Governor  on  November  30, 
1784,  succeeding  Benjamin  Harrison.  He  opposed 
Colonel  Arthur  Campbell's  attempt  to  divide  Virginia 
into  two  States,  and  also  helped  to  bring  about  the 
abandonment  of  the  plan  of  Sevier  and  others  to  set  up 
the  State  of  Franklin.  He  was  interested  in  the  steam 
boat  ideas  of  John  Fitch,  who  visited  him  in  Richmond ; 
corresponded  with  Jefferson  with  regard  to  Houdon's 
statue  of  Washington,  and  with  Washington  himself 
on  the  subject  of  internal  navigation.  His  fifth  term 
extended  from  the  fall  of  1785  to  the  fall  of  1786,  when 
he  declined,  for  a  reason  hereinafter  noted,  to  serve  a 
sixth  time.  His  popularity  was  unabated.  He  himself 
seemed  to  be  growing  broader  and  broader  in  his  views. 
In  fact,  he  even  advocated  the  encouragement  of  mar 
riages  between  whites  and  Indians — an  evidence  of  lib 
erality  little  appreciated  by  some  of  his  admirers.*  As 

*  It  is  evident  that  Henry  was  not  without  his  vagaries — who 
316 


AS  AN  EXECUTIVE 

for  his  broad  Americanism,  that  too  seemed  limitless — 
when,  of  a  sudden,  a  certain  event  of  magnitude  in 
continental  politics  gave  him  pause.  What  this  event 
was,  and  why  it  affected  his  thoughts,  his  feelings,  and 
his  future  course,  will  be  explained  when  we  come  to 
consider  his  attitude  towards  the  Federal  Constitution. 

is,  indeed?  Even  so  great  a  stickler  for  personal  freedom  as 
George  Mason  wished  Congress  to  regulate  the  food  and  cloth 
ing  of  the  people  of  the  United  States. 


317 


XIV 

HIS  SECOND  FAMILY 

LORD  BACON'S  averment  that  "  the  care  of  posterity  is 
most  in  them  that  have  no  posterity  "  did  not  apply  to 
Patrick  Henry.  He  was  the  father  of  seventeen  chil 
dren  * — six  by  his  first  wife  and  eleven  by  his  second, 
Dorothea  Dandridge,  whom  he  married  on  the  ninth  of 
October,  1777.  Colonel  Nathaniel  West  Dandridge, 
the  father  of  Dorothea  Henry,  was  a  brother  of  John 
Dandridge,  the  father  of  Martha  Washington.  It  may 
be  taken  for  granted,  therefore,  that  long  before  this  the 
reader  has  made  the  acquaintance  of  the  Dandridges. 
We  ourselves,  under  the  escort  of  young  Jefferson,  en 
tered  Colonel  Nathaniel's  family  circle  as  far  back  as 
Christmas,  1759,  when  Henry's  passion  was  for  "  music, 
dancing,  and  pleasantry."  At  that  time,  Dorothea,  her 
mother's  namesake,  was  a  girl  of  four. 

We  get  a  curious  glimpse  of  this  Hanover  household 
in  Colonel  Nathaniel's  will,  "  a  true  copy "  of  which, 
"  by  me,  John  Hughes,"  is  now  at  hand.  It  is  dated 
October  8,  1782;  and  one  of  the  minor  items  runs: 
"  I  give  to  my  daughter  Dorithea  Henry  one  negro  slave 
named  Mary,  now  in  her  possession,  as  her  absolute 
property ;  to  my  daughter  Elizabeth,  a  negro  girl  named 
Sukey,  daughter  of  Sary,  and  a  sorrel  mare  called  hers, 
as  her  absolute  property ;  to  my  daughter  Anna  Katha 
rine,  a  negro  girl  named  Sally,  daughter  of  Sary,  and  a 
sorrel  mare  called  hers,  as  her  absolute  property;  and 
to  my  daughter  Mary  Claibourn  Dandridge,  a  negro 

* "  In  the  case  of  Henry,  the  cradle  began  to  rock  in  his 
house  in  his  eighteenth  year,  and  was  rocking  at  his  death 
in  his  sixty-third." — HUGH  BLAIR  GRIGSBY. 


DOROTHEA   SPOTSWOOD,   WIFE   OF   NATHANIEL  WEST   DANURIDGE 

(A  true  Colonial  dame.     Henry  married    her   daughter.     From    a   painting 
owned  by  Mrs.  I.  N.  Jones,  of  Richmond.) 


HIS  SECOND  FAMILY 

girl  named  Sukey,  daughter  of  Doll,  and  a  bay  mare 
called  hers,  as  her  absolute  property." 

This  brings  up  a  picture  of  a  troop  of  dashaway  girls, 
each  in  her  own  saddle,  galloping  to  the  admiration  of 
the  "  cocked-hat  gentry  of  the  Old  Dominion/1  But 
they  had  a  solicitous  and  discreet  dame  for  a  mother — 
Dorothea  Spotswood,  daughter  of  Alexander,  "  a  saga 
cious  statesman,  a  gallant  cavalier,  and  a  brave  and 
dashing  soldier."  He  it  was  who,  wearing  his  scarlet 
velvet,  had  brought  with  him  to  Virginia  a  concession 
of  the  right  of  habeas  corpus,  hitherto  denied — a  detail 
that  serves  to  measure  for  us  the  stride  of  liberty  be 
tween  Spotswood's  day  and  Henry's.  Dorothea's  sister 
Kate,  famed  as  a  beauty,  was  the  great-grandmother  of 
General  Robert  E.  Lee.  Dorothea's  own  portrait  shows 
a  woman  of  much  comeliness,  grace,  dignity,  and  self- 
poise.  Having  herself  dwelt  in  the  "  palace "  at 
Williamsburg,  she  probably  saw  fitness  in  the  matter 
when  her  own  child  entered  it  as  the  bride  of  "  the  most 
considerable  man  in  the  Commonwealth."  Here,  in  the 
same  package  with  the  copy  of  her  husband's  will,  is 
one  of  her  letters,  in  which  she  affectionately  mentions 
"  my  daughter  Henry."  "  My  daughter  Henry  "  was 
so  much  younger  than  her  husband  that  she  retained 
her  bloom  past  the  century's  end,  remarried,  and  lived 
until  the  year  1831. 

When  Henry  left  Williamsburg  at  the  end  of  his  third 
term  as  Governor,  his  young  wife  learned  what  pioneer 
ing  meant,  for  they  migrated  by  the  south-western  trail 
to  the  far  piedmont  country.  With  her  dower  blacks, 
joined  to  Henry's ;  with  their  stock  and  appurtenances ; 
with  Colonel  John  Fontaine's  family  and  goods  in  the 
same  caravan — this  was  doubtless  a  picturesque  moving. 

"  P.  H.,"  says  Colonel  Meredith,  "  was  perhaps  the 
best  husband  in  the  world.  It  is  said  that  he  never  took 
any  important  step  without  consulting  Dolly,  his  wife." 

319 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

"  Dolly  "  bore  him  seven  sons.  Of  their  daughters,  the 
eldest  was  also  named  Dorothea  Spotswood.  About 
the  time  that  Sarah  Butler,  the  second  daughter,  was 
born,  Henry  wrote  from  his  new  home,  "  Leather- 
wood  " :  "I  am  circumstanced  so  as  to  make  my  attend 
ance  on  Congress  impossible ;  "  therefore  he  declined 
the  honor  just  proffered  him.  Perhaps  if  Sarah  Butler 
had  not  come  into  the  world  at  that  time,  1780,  he  would 
have  journeyed  northward,  would  have  reidentified  him 
self  with  continental  affairs,  and  later  would  have  looked 
upon  the  confederacy  with  a  different  eye. 

As  it  was,  Henry  dwelt  for  eight  years  in  the  region 
of  the  Dan.  We  have  seen  that  he  suffered  a  long  ill 
ness  in  Hanover,  and  that  he  made  an  advantageous 
sale  of  his  "  Scotchtown  "  property  there.  We  also 
know  that  it  had  been  his  wish  to  get  over  by  the  moun 
tains.  He  liked  them;  they  delighted  his  eye.  He 
wished  to  be  at  the  edge  of  the  wilderness.  He  had  a 
great  deal  of  the  pioneer  and  pathfinder  in  him.  If  he 
had  not  doubly  "  given  hostages  to  fortune,"  and  also 
married  the  State  herself,  it  is  likely  that  he  would  have 
passed  on  through  the  gaps  and  become  a  Sevier  or  a 
Boone.  The  impulse  to  "  go  west  "  was  natural  with 
men  of  his  adventurous  spirit  and  roaming  disposition. 
Washington  we  associate  with  Mount  Vernon;  Mason 
with  Gunston  Hall ;  Lee  with  Chantilly ;  Jefferson  with 
Monticello;  and  Madison  with  Montpelier — but  there 
is  no  fixity  of  hall  or  home  in  Henry's  case,  until  we  find 
him,  in  his  declining  years,  at  Red  Hill.  There  it  was 
that  the  gypsy  spirit  left  him ;  and  there  he  lingered. 

Like  Washington,  Henry  put  his  spare  money  into 
land.  In  1778  he  owned  two  tracts  in  Botetourt  and  ten 
thousand  acres  in  Kentucky.  In  May  of  that  year  he 
bought  of  Thomas  Lomax  a  three-fifths  part  of  16,650 
acres  on  Leatherwood  Creek.  Jefferson  says  that 
Henry's  "  purchase  was  on  long  credit,  and  finally  paid 

320 


HIS  SECOND  FAMILY 

in  depreciated  paper  not  worth  oak  leaves."  The  facts 
are  that  Henry,  who  could  have  paid  in  paper  money, 
paid  £3000  in  tobacco  notes,  worth  twice  as  much  as 
the  depreciated  currency.  He  raised  £3500  by  the  sale 
of  Botetourt  land  and  £1500  by  the  sale  of  Kentucky 
land.  The  sum  total  required  was  £5000,  and  the  last 
shilling  was  paid  on  time — December  i,  1779.  For 
tunately,  the  records  of  the  transaction  have  been  pre 
served.  They  show  that  Henry  was  fair  and  square, 
then  as  always.  It  is  Jefferson's  statement  that  is  "  not 
worth  oak  leaves." 

Probably  sentimental  reasons  influenced  Henry  in 
some  degree  when  he  moved  down  into  Henry  County. 
It  had  been  set  off  in  1776  from  the  great  border  county 
of  Pittsylvania,  which  was  itself  erected  in  1767 — a  time 
when  the  elder  William  Pitt  stood  especially  high  with 
mankind.  The  part  of  Henry  County  nearest  the  Blue 
Ridge  became  the  county  of  Patrick  in  1791.  Thus  an 
extraordinary  honor  befell  Henry  in  that  section  of  the 
State.  But  so  popular  a  man  was  sure  to  be  remem 
bered  in  the  matter  of  naming  things.  Ohio,  Indiana, 
Illinois,  Kentucky,  and  Tennessee  all  have  Henry  coun 
ties.  A  parish  was  called  after  him;  a  street  in  Rich 
mond  ;  and  an  enormous  number  of  babies.  The  steam 
boat  "  Patrick  Henry "  was  famous  in  its  day.  In 
"  Emory  and  Henry  College,"  however,  Elizabeth 
Henry,  not  Patrick,  is  honored. 

The  Leatherwood  country  was  wild  and  beautiful. 
Within  view  towards  the  west  were  the  spurs  and  knobs 
of  the  Blue  Ridge.  The  "  Pinnacles  of  the  Dan  "  could 
not  but  challenge  the  admiration  of  the  beholder,  and 
the  way  the  river  leaped  down  the  mountain-side  was 
indeed  a  marvellous  sight.  All  that  was  romantic  in 
respect  to  rivers,  hills,  streams,  and  forests  Henry  must 
have  enjoyed ;  but  he  probably  did  not  like  certain  ex 
hibitions  of  "  squatter  sovereignty "  in  those  parts. 
21  321 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

Some  of  the  squatters  were  on  his  own  land.  It  is  still 
a  wild  region,  and  the  present-day  pilgrim,  in  crossing 
the  high  hills,  may  chance  to  spy  moonshiner  smoke 
curling  up  from  some  remote  ravine. 

The  pilgrim  sees  a  pleasant  place  when  he  comes  to 
Patrick  Henry's  old  home,  on  the  Danville  and  Wythe- 
ville  turnpike.  It  is  eight  miles  from  the  Henry  County 
Court-house,  being  one  hundred  and  ninety-two  miles 
south-west  of  Richmond.  "  Situate  on  the  waters  of  the 
famous  Leatherwood  Creek,"  it  is  surrounded  by  "  beau 
tiful  hill  views,  with  the  creek  twisting  itself  through 
them,  and  high  mountains  at  a  distance."  The  creek 
passes  south  into  the  Dan.  For  many  years  Jesse  Woot- 
ton,  Sheriff  of  Henry,  lived  on  the  five-hundred-acre 
home  place,  which  is  now  owned  by  James  M.  Barker. 
A  part  of  the  original  Henry  dwelling  still  stands.  Tra 
ditions  that  will  outlast  it  are  heard  along  the  Leather- 
wood,  and  in  the  records  and  archives  of  the  Henry 
County  Court  one  finds  numerous  references  to  the  great 
Patrick.* 

But  if  he  expected  restoration  to  health  in  the  hilly 
country,  with  its  pure  air  and  pure  spring-water,  Henry 
was  disappointed.  Malaria  gave  him  some  bad  turns. 
If  he  hoped  to  improve  his  fortune  there,  he  was  again 
disappointed.  In  fact,  necessity  compelled  him  to  leave 
Leatherwood  and  find  a  seat  in  a  more  thickly  popu 
lated  country.  Hence  we  see  him  once  more  on  the 

*  N.  London,  writing  in  the  Danville  Times,  of  July  4,  1879. 
says :  "  The  sturdy  and  strong-minded  John  Reamey,  who  died 
since  the  late  war,  resided  but  a  few  miles  from  the  Henry 
mansion,  and  had  seen  Mr.  Henry  frequently.  His  fine  mem 
ory  retained  the  knowledge  of  Mr.  H.  and  his  manners.  He 
was  peculiarly  entertaining  in  recounting  the  sharp  use  of 
tongues  between  his  mother  and  the  Governor,  when  she  dis 
appointed  him  in  the  making  up  of  his  leather  breeches,  at 
which  she  was  expert,  and  which  was  then  an  art  possessed  by 
few." 

,322 


HIS  SECOND  FAMILY 

wing,  and  note  the  journey  of  his  patriarchal  caravan 
from  the  waters  of  the  Dan  to  the  region  of  the  Appo- 
mattox. 

We  should  bear  in  mind  that  Henry's  expenses  were 
all  the  heavier  because  he  sought  to  so  conduct  himself 
while  Governor  as  to  earn  the  respect  of  all  sorts  of 
citizens.  From  the  fall  of  1784  to  the  fall  of  1786,  he 
lived  at  a  seat  called  "  Salisbury,"  thirteen  miles  west 
of  Richmond,  near  the  present  Midlothian,  in  Chester 
field  County.  The  farm  spread  out  for  the  space  of 
sixteen  thousand  acres,  beautifully  wooded,  and  the 
house  was  a  quaint  old  structure.  Judge  Roane  says: 
"  With  respect  to  his  family,  they  were  furnished  with 
an  excellent  coach  (at  a  time  when  these  vehicles  were 
not  so  common  as  at  present  [1814]);  they  lived  as 
genteelly  and  associated  with  as  polished  society  as  those 
of  any  Governor  before  or  since  have  done.  He  enter 
tained  as  much  company  as  others,  and  in  as  genteel 
a  style,  and  when  at  the  end  of  two  years  he  resigned 
the  office,  he  had  greatly  exceeded  the  salary,  and  was 
in  debt,  which  was  one  cause  that  induced  him  to  resume 
the  practice  of  the  law."  In  October,  1786,  we  find 
Henry  writing  to  his  sister,  Mrs.  Anne  Christian : 

"  I  shall  resign  my  office  next  month  and  retire,  my  wife 
and  myself  being  heartily  tired  of  the  bustle  we  live  in  here. 
I  shall  go  to  Hanover  to  land  I  am  like  to  get  of  Gen.  Nelson, 
or  if  that  fails,  towards  Leatherwood  again.  My  wife  has  five 
very  fine  and  promising  children." 

Fifty  years  old,  in  debt,  and  with  a  young  family  to 
rear,  Henry  did  not  cease  to  think  of  his  younger  sons 
by  his  first  marriage.  He  felt  that  they  ought  to  be 
sent  to  some  such  college  as  Hampden-Sidney.  Ac 
cordingly,  he  gave  up  the  idea  of  returning  to  Hanover, 
and  soon  settled  his  family  near  this  college,  in  Prince 
Edward  County,  eighty  miles  south-west  of  Richmond. 

323 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

He  bought  of  Colonel  John  Holcombe  seventeen  hun 
dred  acres  of  land  for  £2111,  paying  in  other  land  and  in 
slaves.  "  He  dwelt  on  the  Appomattox,"  says  Henry 
Howe ;  and  there  was  a  beautiful  avenue  of  black  locust- 
trees  in  front  of  the  house.  Referring  to  Henry  at  this 
period,  Judge  Edmund  Winston  says :  "  He  had  never 
been  in  easy  circumstances ;  and  soon  after  his  removal 
to  Prince  Edward  County,  conversing  with  his  usual 
frankness  with  one  of  his  neighbors,  he  expressed  his 
anxiety  under  the  debts  which  he  was  not  able  to  pay; 
the  reply  was  to  this  effect :  '  Go  back  to  the  bar — your 
tongue  will  soon  pay  your  debts.  If  you  promise  to  go, 
I  will  give  you  a  retaining  fee  on  the  spot.'  This  blunt 
advice  determined  him  to  return  to  the  practice  of  the 
law,  which  he  did  in  the  beginning  of  1788;  and  during 
six  years  he  attended  regularly  the  district  courts  of 
Prince  Edward  and  New  London." 

The  man  who  gave  this  advice  was  probably  Colonel 
Holcombe.  A  fee  of  £5  from  him  was  the  first  received 
by  Henry  since  1774.  How  hard  he  worked  at  the  bar 
during  the  next  six  years  will  be  set  forth  in  subsequent 
pages.  Meantime,  before  telling  of  his  battle  against 
the  adoption  of  the  Federal  Constitution,  it  is  incumbent 
upon  us  to  draw  closer  to  his  domestic  life  during  his 
residence  in  Prince  Edward. 

The  same  desk  that  Henry  used  in  his  office  by  the 
Appomattox  is  now  at  Red  Hill ;  and  it  is  filled  with 
letters,  bonds,  agreements,  plots  of  land,  receipts,  and 
private  memoranda.  The  Prince  Edward  letters  and 
documents  run  from  1787  to  1792.  They  are  dry 
enough  in  the  main,  just  as  every  advocate's  private 
papers  are;  but  a  scrap  here  and  a  sentence  there  flash 
little  gleams  of  light  back  into  the  past,  and  finally  we 
get  enough  of  this  light  to  enable  us  to  see  "  Mrs.  Henry 
and  her  charming  family "  in  their  Prince  Edward 
home.  At  "  Salisbury  "  there  had  been  five  "  fine  and 

324 


HIS  SECOND  FAMILY 

promising "  children ;  now  there  were  six,  seven — 
Dorothea,  up  and  growing,  Sarah,  Martha  Catharine, 
Patrick,  Fayette,  Alexander  Spotswood,  Nathaniel. 
Richard  died  a  baby.  Edward  Winston  and  John,  of 
Red  Hill  fame,  would  complete  this  remarkable  family. 
It  so  happened  that  Richard  N.  Venable,  of  the  Prince 
Edward  bar,  kept  a  diary  during  this  period,  and  in  it 
we  find  references  not  only  to  "  Patrick  Henry's  persua 
sive  eloquence,"  as  heard  at  the  Court-house,  but  to 
Henry's  home : 

"  Thursday,  May  10,  1792.  Go  with  brother  Nathaniel  to 
Colonel  Patrick  Henry's,  spend  the  balance  of  the  day  and 
take  dinner  with  him.  Mr.  John  Fontaine's  widow  [Henry's 
eldest  daughter]  is  here  with  her  family,  and  has  been  here 
ever  since  the  death  of  her  husband.  Mrs.  Roane  and  her 
family  also.  What  a  weight  of  worldly  concerns  rest  upon  this 
old  man's  shoulders !  He  supports  it  with  strength  and 
fortitude,  but  nature  must  sink  under  the  load  ere  long.  His 
head  now  blossoms  for  the  grave,  his  body  bends  to  mingle 
with  its  kindred  dust,  but  his  fame  shall  remain  and  grow  like 
the  tall  oak  of  the  forest,  that  spreads  its  broad  head  in  the 
wind  and  rejoices  in  the  storm;  his  body  shall  be  mingled  with 
the  dust  of  the  plowman  and  be  known  no  more,  but  the 
powers  of  his  mind  shall  be  a  stream  of  light  to  other  times." 

Henry  dearly  loved  his  children  and  grandchildren. 
His  son  "  Neddy,"  who  died  in  1794,  was  low  in  health, 
and  was  an  object  of  solicitude  at  this  time.  His  grand 
son,  Edmund  Fontaine,  had  just  died,  and  news  came  of 
the  death  of  his  beloved  sister  Anne.  So  when  we  read 
in  the  Venable  diary :  "  Patrick  Henry  sick  .  .  .  many 
cases  continued  for  him  .  .  .  business  much  retarded 
by  the  absence  of  P.  Henry,"  we  are  not  surprised. 

And  now  once  more  the  roamer  pulled  up  his  tent- 
stakes.  He  sold  his  land  on  the  Appomattox  and  moved 
to  the  wilder  banks  of  the  Staunton,  buying  his  land  in 
that  quarter  of  Messrs.  Fuqua,  Booker,  Watkins,  and 

325 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

others.  At  a  later  date  Henry  also  bought  lands  in  the 
same  section  of  General  Henry  Lee.  Since  the  war  Lee 
had  been  one  of  the  rising  men  in  Virginia.  "  Dragoon 
Harry,"  he  was  called.  His  parents  were  considered 
unintellectual — dull,  indeed ;  whereas  the  leader  of  the 
Legion  was  particularly  quick  as  a  thinker.  So  a 
familiar  friend  asked  him  how  it  happened  that  with 
such  a  father  and  such  a  mother  he  himself  should  be 
what  he  was.  "  Two  negatives  make  an  affirmative," 
said  "  Dragoon  Harry,"  solving  the  puzzle. 


326 


XV. 

CHIEF   CRITIC   OF   THE    CONSTITUTION. 

"  MR.  SPEAKER,"  said  a  member  of  the  British  Par 
liament,  "  I  hear  a  lion  roaring  in  the  lobby.  Shall  we 
shut  the  door  against  him,  sir,  or  shall  we  let  him  in  to 
see  if  we  are  able  to  turn  him  out  again  ?  " 

Which  reminds  us  that  we  have  now  come  to  the 
stirring  story  of  Patrick  Henry  and  the  Federal  Con 
stitution. 

Americans,  as  a  rule,  like  to  think  of  Henry  as  one 
of  the  men  who  kindled  the  fires  of  the  Revolution; 
and  most  people  are  willing  to  leave  it  at  that.  They 
feel  that  the  logic  of  Nineteenth  Century  events  proved 
him  right  in  1765  and  in  1775;  therefore  they  do  not 
concern  themselves  as  to  whether  he  were  right  or 
wrong  in  1788.  They  vaguely  recall  a  school-book 
statement  to  the  effect  that  he  fought  hard  against  the 
Federal  Constitution,  which  the  Nineteenth  Century 
popularized.  Or  perhaps  they  remember  what  Roose 
velt  said  in  "  The  Winning  of  the  West " :  "  Patrick 
Henry  himself  made  one  slip  when  he  opposed  the 
adoption  of  the  Constitution." 

These  lovers  of  the  patriot  days  are  fair-minded 
enough ;  but  we  have  also  a  school  of  writers  who  seem 
incapable  of  taking  a  just  view  of  Henry's  attitude 
towards  the  new  government.  They  deny,  or  ignore, 
or  distort  historic  facts.  They  fetch  forth  a  fragment 
of  a  fact,  without  its  atmosphere,  and  exhibit  it  as  a 
scientist  would  a  fossil.  They  rely  upon  present  senti 
ment  to  float  their  assertions,  which  go  unchallenged 
because  he  who  challenges  them  must  take  the  unpopu 
lar  side  in  foolish  renewal  of  a  ferocious  controversy 

327 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

long  since  ended.  But  while  war  settles  controversies 
and  gives  a  new  direction  to  human  affairs,  prior  events 
are  not  to  be  historically  denied.  And  it  is  dishonest 
to  color  proven  facts,  or  distort  them,  or  dress  them 
up,  in  order  that  they  may  masquerade  as  history.  We 
must  dig  below  the  surface  of  to-day — dig  through 
the  stratum  of  1861,  and  even  go  beneath  another, 
before  we  can  lay  bare  the  ground  on  which  Henry 
and  Mason  stood  when  they  battled  against  the  Con- 
sti£jition. 

(Both  of  these  men  were  actuated  by  the  purest  of 
motives.  Henry's  stand  was  all  the  more  admirable 
because  he  ran  the  risk  not  only  of  losing  his  hold  as 
a  leader,  but  of  alienating  such  friends  as  Washington. 
"  His  hostility  to  the  Constitution,"  says  E.  H.  Cummins, 
"  proceeded  entirely  from  an  apprehension  that  the 
government  it  proposed  would  swallow  up  the  State 
authorities,  and  ultimately  the  liberty  of  the  people 
would  be  destroyed  or  crushed  by  the  overgrown,  pon 
derous  consolidation  of  political  power."  Howe  says : 

"He  was  opposed  to  the  adoption  of  the  Federal  Con 
stitution  because  he  thought  it  gave  too  much  power  to  the 
Federal  Government ;  and  in  conversation  with  the  father  of 
the  late  venerable  Senator  from  Prince  Edward,  he  remarked, 
with  emphasis:  'The  President  of  the  United  States  will 
always  come  in  at  the  head  of  a  party.  You  do  not  now  think 
much  of  the  patronage  of  the  President ;  but  the  day  is 
coming  when  it  will  be  tremendous,  and  from  this  power  the 
country  may  sooner  or  later  fall.' " 

Could  Henry  have  lived  another  life,  and  still  another 
— could  he,  in  serene  contemplation,  have  watched  the 
growth  of  the  West;  the  rise  of  industrialism;  the 
changes  wrought  by  the  cotton-gin,  by  steam,  by  elec 
tricity,  and  by  the  thousand  agencies  of  modern  man — 
he  would  have  modified  many  of  his  conclusions  of  June, 
1788,  would  have  cancelled  many  more,  and  would  have 

328 


CHIEF  CRITIC  OF  THE  CONSTITUTION 

clung  only  to  those  which  are  as  true  to-day  as  they 
were  then.  Nor  should  we  forget  that  Henry's  hostility 
to  the  Federal  Constitution  served  a  beneficent  pur 
pose.  It  was  necessary  to  put  the  new  instrument 
through  lire  in  order  to  test  it  and  temper  it.  Henry 
certainly  put  it  through  fire.  Not  only  that,  he  forced 
the  adoption  of  the  first  ten  amendments,  and  so,  prac 
tically,  was  one  of  the  great  makers  of  the  Constitution. 
Incidentally,  he  enunciated  the  principle  of  State 
Rights.  But  his  object  with  respect  to  State  Rights 
was  to  point  out  a  future  peril,  and  when,  in  course  of 
time,  he  was  asked  to  take  a  personal  stand  upon  the 
doctrine,  he  refused  to  doj|oj 

The  question  arises:  Why  did  Henry,  Mason,  and 
their  associates  oppose  the  adoption  of  the  Constitution, 
and  Washington,  Madison,  Randolph,  and  their  asso 
ciates  favor  it?  Then,  straightway,  other  questions 
thrust  themselves  forward:  What  was  the  state  of 
Henry's  mind  towards  the  general  government  after 
the  war?  Did  he  believe  in  a  weak  federation?  Did 
he  wish  to  see  the  Union  kept  up?  And,  if  so,  how 
much  more  power  was  he  willing  to  grant  Congress? 
Was  he  not  less  national  in  spirit  than  he  had  been 
when,  thirteen  years  before,  he  stood  up  in  Carpenters' 
Hall  and  said :  "  I  am  not  a  Virginian,  but  an  Ameri 
can.  .  .  .  All  America  is  thrown  into  one  mass  "  ? 
Had  he  not  now,  indeed,  become  one  of  the  most  Vir 
ginian  of  the  Virginians?  We  have  seen  under  what 
circumstances  he  quit  the  army.  If  he  had  camped 
with  New  Englanders  and  Pennsylvanians,  if  he  had 
campaigned  with  Washington,  perhaps  he  would  have 
looked  at  affairs  with  a  different  eye.  Let  us  bear 
in  mind,  also,  that  his  opinion  of  Congress  had  been 
formed  when  it  was  a  capable  body.  He  had  seen  it  at 
a  time  when  it  was  animated  with  the  first  breathings 
of  liberty.  Zeal,  determination,  the  pluck  that  takes 

329 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

one  to  the  self-sacrificial  verge — these  were  in  full 
flower.  But  later  the  spirit  of  Congress  lessened.  When 
Madison  was  a  member,  he  saw  how  weak  it  was — 
how  poor  in  its  powers.  Therefore  Madison  now  under 
stood  the  necessity  of  a  Congress  and  an  Executive 
with  actual  authority.  He  had  been  down  in  the  Con 
tinental  slough,  and  had  come  out  of  it  a  Federalist. 
Henry  had  not  been  personally  in  this  slough,  and  he 
was  less  mindful  than  Madison  of  the  impotence  of 
Congress. 

From  a  junior  in  Henry's  Privy  Council,  ten  years 
before,  Madison  had  risen  rapidly.  Ceracchi's  medal 
lion  of  him  gives  us  his  true  profile,  and  it  shows  a 
more  virile  face  than  that  which  as  a  rule  looks  so 
benignly  down  upon  us.  John  Fiske,  indeed,  seems 
justified  when  he  says  Madison  "  never  crossed  the 
Atlantic;  yet  for  the  range,  depth,  and  minuteness  of 
his  knowledge  of  ancient  and  modern  histories  and  of 
constitutional  law,  he  has  been  rivalled  by  no  other 
English-speaking  statesman  save  Edmund  Burke." 
Madison  and  Randolph  were  young.  They  were  san 
guine.  Age,  gout,  and  bile  make  men  less  sanguine; 
and  Henry,  as  we  have  seen,  was  as  bilious  as  Mason 
was  gouty.  Old  men  grow  fond  of  the  banners  they 
have  borne  in  battle,  and  they  look  askance  at  innova 
tions.  Henry  and  Mason  had  put  so  much  of  them 
selves  into  the  existing  State  government  that  they  were 
naturally  partial  to  it.  They  had  erected  a  republican 
sovereignty  and  hedged  it  about  with  civil  safeguards; 
and  they  were  satisfied  with  their  work. 

But  were  they  satisfied  with  the  general  government 
— a  loose  league  of  States,  incapable  of  vigorous  action  ? 
Were  they  more  patriotic  with  respect  to  Commonwealth 
than  to  country?  We  are  bound  to  ask  these  questions, 
and  determine  for  ourselves  whether  Henry  had  lost 
something  of  his  high  outlook,  his  Continental  per- 

330 


CHIEF  CRITIC  OF  THE  CONSTITUTION 

spective — in  a  word,  his  ardent  Americanism  of  1775 
as  contradistinguished  from  his  intensified  Virginianism 
of  1788.  Of  course,  we  should  bear  in  mind  that  men 
grow  perfervid  in  the  first  flush  of  war,  and  that  when 
peace  comes,  they  lapse  somewhat  in  enthusiasm.  It 
was  so  in  Henry's  case.  He  believed  that  his  best  work 
could  be  done  just  where  he  was  doing  it.  "  The  idea 
that  the  States  were  to  be  the  centres  of  political  life 
was  axiomatic  in  the  South,"  says  Moncure  D.  Conway. 
Henry  Adams  urges  that  Union  there  "  was  a  question 
of  expediency,  not  of  obligation  " ;  and  he  adds :  "  This 
was  the  conviction  of  the  true  Virginia  school,  and  of 
Jefferson's  opponents  as  well  as  of  his  supporters ;  of 
Patrick  Henry,  as  well  as  of  John  Taylor  of  Caroline  and 
John  Randolph  of  Roanoke."  But  this  latter  generali 
zation  glitters  somewhat,  as  the  moonshine  glittered  on 
Randolph's  celebrated  mackerel.  Beyond  all  question, 
expediency  was  much  considered  in  Virginia,  as  in  every 
other  State ;  but  there  was  also  a  feeling  that  those 
who  had  gone  through  the  war  together  should  have 
a  common  flag.  We  do  not  think  that  Henry  ever 
forgot  the  full  title  of  "  The  Articles  of  Confederation 
and  Perpetual  Union  between  the  States."  Nor  until 
August,  1786,  did  he  nurse  in  his  breast  any  of  that 
"  jealousy  of  Federal  power  "  which  Rives  assures  us 
began  to  prevail  in  1783.  When  Henry  took  alarm  in 
the  matter,  it  was  all  of  a  sudden,  and  it  was  on  account 
of  a  proceeding  which  he  deemed  especially  ominous. 
Let  us  pass  speedily  and  in  order  from  event  to  event, 
so  that  we  may  understand  the  change  that  came  over 
him.  In  1781  he  favored  an  act  empowering  Congress 
to  obtain  a  revenue  by  levying  a  duty  on  imports.  He 
was  at  home,  sick,  during  the  fall  session  of  1782 ;  and 
Richard  Henry  Lee  successfully  led  a  movement  for  the 
repeal  of  the  act.  But  in  the  spring  of  1783  another 
measure,  duly  modified  so  as  to  help  Congress  to  the 

33i 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

money  without  compromising  the  State,  was  advocated 
by  Henry.  It  would  have  passed,  no  doubt,  but  for  a 
paper  written  by  Hamilton,  which  alarmed  many  mem 
bers.  Again  Henry  attempted  to  assist  the  general 
government  in  raising  the  revenue,  and  this  time,  June, 
1783,  succeeded.  His  chief  reason  for  returning  to 
the  Legislature  in  1784  was  that  he  might  "  strengthen 
the  Federal  arm."  On  May  I4th  of  that  year,  William 
Short  wrote  to  Jefferson: 

"  You  will  be  pleased  when  I  inform  you  of  a  conversation 
last  evening  between  Mr.  Henry,  Mr.  Madison,  and  Mr. 
[Joseph]  Jones.  I  was  left  in  the  coffee-house  with  these 
three.  Mr.  Henry  told  them  he  wished  much  to  have  a 
conference  on  a  subject  of  importance.  The  event  of  it  was 
that  Mr.  Jones  and  Mr.  Madison  should  sketch  out  some 
plan  for  giving  greater  power  to  the  Federal  Government, 
and  that  Mr.  Henry  should  support  it  on  the  floor.  It  was 
thought  a  bold  example  set  by  Virginia  would  have  influence  on 
the  other  States.  Mr.  Henry  declared  that  it  was  the  only  in 
ducement  he  had  for  coming  to  the  present  Assembly.  He 
saw  ruin  inevitable  unless  something  was  done  to  give  Congress 
a  compulsory  process  on  delinquent  States." 

Next  day  Madison  wrote  to  Jefferson :  "  Mr.  Henry 
arrived  yesterday,  and  from  a  short  conversation  I  find 
him  strenuous  for  invigorating  the  Federal  Govern 
ment,  though  without  any  precise  plan."  The  plan  was 
not  long  in  forming.  A  series  of  resolutions  so  point 
edly  in  support  of  Congress  as  to  cause  them  to  be 
called  "  coercive  "  were  adopted  in  Committee  of  the 
Whole ;  and  Henry  stood  out  as  the  champion  of  the 
general  government.  This  act,  in  line  with  Henry's 
whole  conduct  up  to  that  moment,  and  up  to  August, 
1786,  was  not  forgotten  by  those  who  sought  to  over 
throw  him  in  the  course  of  the  Constitutional  debates. 
"  I  am  sure  that  the  gentleman  recognizes  his  child," 
said  George  Nicholas,  with  some  sarcasm,  meaning 
the  child  Coercion.  Undoubtedly  Henry  must  have 

332 


CHIEF  CRITIC  OF  THE  CONSTITUTION 

disapproved  of  much  that  was  going  on  in  Congress. 
Months  before  the  coercive  plan,  Pierce  Butler  wrote 
from  Philadelphia  to  Judge  Iredell,  of  North  Carolina: 

"  So  greatly  altered  is  this  once  august  body,  that  as  little 
as  possible  is  intrusted  to  them.  And  yet,  among  them  are 
many  individuals  of  the  strictest  honor  and  great  worth; 
but,  as  a  body,  there  is  little  dependence  to  be  placed  on  them. 
The  Northern  interest  is  all  prevalent;  their  members  are 
firmly  united,  and  carry  many  measures  disadvantageous  to 
the  Southern  interest.  They  are  laboring  hard  to  get  Vermont 
established  as  an  independent  State,  which  will  give  them 
another  vote,  by  which  the  balance  will  be  quite  destroyed." 

But  if  Henry  knew  of  this  beginning  of  sectional 
friction,  it  does  not  seem  to  have  affected  him.  What 
was  it,  then,  that  caused  him  all  at  once  to  turn  about 
in  alarm,  look,  bristle,  and  say,  in  substance,  "  I  am 
persuaded  from  what  I  see  that  the  General  Govern 
ment  is  strong  enough  as  it  stands  "  ?  Who  was  it,  and 
what? 

Again  may  we  pass  speedily  and  in  order  from  event 
to  event.  By  the  Treaty  of  Paris,  the  Mississippi  River 
was  left  open  to  American  shipping.  New  England 
now  proposed  that  it  should  be  shut  for  twenty-five  or 
thirty  years;  otherwise  she  would  secede.  This  it  was 
that  struck  Henry  aback  and  made  him  an  Anti-Feder 
alist.  Moses  Coit  Tyler  declares  that  the  effect  upon 
him  was  "  powerful  enough  to  reverse  entirely  the 
habitual  direction  of  his  political  thought  and  conduct." 
Moncure  D.  Conway,  speaking  of  the  proposed  occlusion 
of  the  Mississippi,  says :  "  From  that  time  Patrick 
Henry,  who  ruled  the  heart  of  his  State,  became  jealous 
of  the  Federal  power;  and  he  watched  the  proceedings 
at  Annapolis  for  a  commercial  union  with  suspicion." 

The  whole  story  of  the  project  was  told  in  a  letter 
received  by  Henry  from  his  friend  James  Monroe, 
afterwards  President,  at  that  time  a  Virginia  delegate 

333 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

in  Congress.  They  wrote  long  letters  in  those  days, 
and  this  one  by  Monroe,  dated  New  York,  August  12, 
1786,  contained  more  than  two  thousand  words.  Monroe 
began  by  lamenting  the  lack  of  a  cipher  in  which  to 
convey  his  secret  and  critical  news.  Don  Diego  Guar- 
doqui,  the  envoy  of  Spain,  who  had  arrived  in  America 
in  July,  1785,  was  negotiating  a  treaty  with  John  Jay. 
Guardoqui's  object  was  to  win  the  Mississippi  Valley 
for  Spain,  and  he  was  seeking  to  trade  off  Southern 
interests  for  Northern  support  in  Congress.  He  tempted 
the  Northern  men  with  open  Spanish  ports,  and  even 
promised  to  buy  masts  and  ship-timber  for  cthe  royal 
navy  from  the  New  Englanders.  The  Articles  of  Con 
federation  required  the  sanction  of  nine  States  in  a 
treaty;  but  it  was  proposed  to  push  the  Jay-Guardoqui 
treaty  through  with  seven.  "  This  is  one  of  the  most 
extraordinary  transactions  I  have  ever  known,"  wrote 
Monroe.  One  great  object  was  "  to  break  up  the  set 
tlements  on  the  Western  waters,"  to  "  keep  the  States 
southward  as  they  now  are/'  and  "  throw  the  weight  of 
population  eastward,  and  keep  it  there."  Committees 
of  Eastern  men  had  been  discussing  "the  subject  of 
a  dismemberment  of  the  States  east  of  the  Hudson  from 
the  Union,  and  the  erection  of  them  into  a  separate 
government."  Another  scheme  for  dismemberment 
divided  the  two  confederacies  at  the  Potomac. 

If  this  be  unpleasant  reading  for  us,  how  much  more 
disillusionizing  and  saddening  and  shocking  it  must 
have  been  for  Patrick  Henry !  He  was  peculiarly  inter 
ested  in  the  West  and  South-west.  There  had  always 
been  a  magnet  in  that  part  of  the  country,  drawing  him 
thither  in  his  dreams.  He  loved  it.  His  dear  Anne 
was  grieving  beyond  the  mountains  at  that  moment 
for  her  lost  husband.*  Kentucky  was  not  Kentucky  to 

*  Colonel  William  Christian,  husband  of  Anne  Henry,  was 
334 


CHIEF  CRITIC  OF  THE  CONSTITUTION 

him,  but  as  much  a  part  of  Virginia  as  the  ground  upon 
which  he  walked.  As  Governor,  he  was  in  duty  bound 
to  protect  all  that  vast  territory,  a  third  larger  than 
Great  Britain  and  Ireland;  and  it  would  be  a  present 
crime  against  the  State,  as  well  as  a  crime  against  the 
future  population  in  the  Mississippi  Valley,  if  the  snags 
and  mud  of  Jay  and  Guardoqui  should  be  permitted 
to  choke  the  noble  river,  up  which  would  come  creeping 
innumerable  alligators,  and  with  them  Spanish  civili 
zation.  No  wonder  the  imaginative  old  patriot  was 
sobered  and  soured.  As  William  Wirt  Henry  expresses 
it :  "  That  the  Northern  States,  for  which  Virginia  had 
done  so  much,  should,  from  a  purely  selfish  policy, 
attempt  to  barter  away  the  navigation  of  the  Mississippi, 
so  valuable  to  her,  at  the  risk  of  losing  the  all-import 
ant  Western  country,  was  a  shock  to  him  indeed."  A 
week  after  the  Virginia  House  of  Delegates  had  adopted 
a  series  of  resolutions  against  the  Jay-Guardoqui  project, 
Madison  wrote  to  Washington  from  Richmond : . 

"  I  am  entirely  convinced,  from  what  I  observe  here,'  that 
unless  the  project  of  Congress  for  ceding  to  Spain  the  Mis 
sissippi  for  twenty-five  years  can  be  reversed,  the  hopes  ot 
carrying  this  State  into  a  proper  Federal  system  will  be 
demolished.  Many  of  our  most  Federal  leading  men  are 
extremely  soured  by  what  has  already  passed.  Mr.  Henry, 
who  has  been  hitherto  the  champion  of  the  Federal  cause, 
has  become  a  cold  advocate,  and  in  the  event  of  an  actual 
sacrifice  of  the  Mississippi  by  Congress  will  unquestionably  go 
over  to  the  other  side." 

A  little  later,  John  Marshall  wrote  to  Arthur  Lee : 

"Mr.  Henry,  whose  opinions  have  their  usual  influence, 
has  been  heard  to  say  that  he  would  rather  part  with  the 
confederation  than  relinquish  the  navigation  of  the  Missis 
sippi." _^ 

"killed  in  action  by  the  Indians,  April  9,  1786,  aged  43.  The 
stout  hero,"  says  Wallace,  "  was  laid  to  rest  at  his  seat  called 
*  Oxmoor,'  a  few  miles  from  Louisville,  on  the  Beargrass." 

335 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

Madison  and  Edmund  Randolph,  who  succeeded 
Henry  as  Governor,  were  adroit  and  tireless  workers 
in  behalf  of  the  establishment  of  a  new  order  of  things. 
What  a  pity  it  is  that  a  shadow  fell  upon  the  otherwise 
splendid  career  of  Edmund  Randolph !  In  a  time  of 
rancorous  politics,  his  enemies  accused  him  of  pecula 
tion,  and  his  fame  suffered  a  long  eclipse.  Moncure  D. 
Conway  is  sure  of  his  innocence ;  and  we  should  rejoice 
to  believe  in  it.  But  whether  we  regard  him  as  guiltless 
or  as  a  lesser  Lord  Bacon,  we  are  obliged  to  recognize 
the  magnitude  of  his  services  at  this  critical  period 
in  American  affairs.  Madison  says  that  the  first  man 
to  suggest  in  print  that  a  Constitutional  Convention 
be  held  was  Pelatiah  Webster,  "  an  able  but  not  con 
spicuous  citizen,"  who  published  a  pamphlet  on  the 
subject  in  May,  1781.  In  a  private  letter  to  James 
Duane,  Alexander  Hamilton  had  made  a  similar  sugges 
tion  as  early  as  September  3,  1780. 

As  to  the  actual  origin  of  the  Convention :  Certain 
Maryland  and  Virginia  Commissioners,  seeking  to  form 
a  navigation  compact,  found  that  they  lacked  power  in 
essential  matters ;  hence,  in  sequence,  the  Annapolis 
conference  between  delegates  from  five  States ;  hence,  in 
further  sequence,  the  election  of  deputies  by  the  Legis 
latures  of  twelve  States,  to  meet  at  Philadelphia  in  the 
spring  of  1787.  The  winter  that  intervened  was  an 
anxious  and  busy  time  for  such  ardent  Federalists  as 
Madison  and  Randolph.  In  a  flattering  and  persuasive 
letter,  Randolph  notified  Henry  of  his  appointment  as 
one  of  the  seven  Virginia  deputies,  and  reminded  him 
that  "  the  neglect  of  the  present  moment  might  ter 
minate  in  the  destruction  of  Confederate  America." 
But  Henry  replied :  "  It  is  with  much  concern  that  I 
feel  myself  constrained  to  decline  acting  under  this 
appointment."  He  gave  no  reason.  Probably  Ran 
dolph  again  urged  him  to  accept;  for,  on  March  i,  the 

336 


CHIEF  CRITIC  OF  THE  CONSTITUTION 

Governor  wrote  to  Madison  that  Congress  must  have 
done  with  all  talk  of  shutting  up  the  Mississippi,  add 
ing  :  "  It  will  not  be  sufficient  to  negative  it  merely ; 
but  a  negative  with  some  emphasis  can  alone  secure 
Mr.  Henry  to  the  objects  of  the  Convention  at  Philadel 
phia.  I  have  essayed  every  means  to  prevail  on  him 
to  go  thither.  But  he  is  peremptory  in  refusing,  as 
distressed  in  his  private  circumstances."  Madison 
wrote  to  Washington :  "  I  hear  from  Richmond,  with 
much  concern,  that  Mr.  Henry  has  positively  declined 
his  mission  to  Philadelphia.  Besides  the  loss  of  his 
services  on  that  theatre,  there  is  danger,  I  fear,  that 
this  step  has  proceeded  from  a  wish  to  leave  his  conduct 
unfettered  on  another  theatre,  where  the  result  of  the 
Convention  will  receive  its  destiny  from  his  omnipo 
tence."  To  Jefferson,  then  in  France,  Madison  wrote 
that  though  the  Mississippi  was  not  to  be  sacrificed, 
"  the  intention  and  the  attempt  "  had  done  harm.  "  Mr, 
Henry's  disgust,"  he  said,  "  exceeds  all  measure,  and  I 
am  not  singular  in  ascribing  his  refusal  to  attend  the 
Convention  to  the  policy  of  keeping  himself  free  to 
combat  or  espouse  the  result  of  it,  according  to  the 
result  of  the  Mississippi  business,  among  other  cir 
cumstances." 

Thus  it  is  clear  that  Henry  was  in  no  state  of  mind 
to  surrender  sovereign  attributes  of  any  sort  for  the 
sake  of  strengthening  a  general  government  which  had 
just  demonstrated  that  it  might  become  a  curse  instead 
of  a  blessing.  It  may  be  said  that  he  made  too  much  of 
the  Mississippi  matter ;  it  may  be  urged  with  pertinency 
that  the  languishing  trade  of  Northern  ports  excused, 
or  at  least  explained,  the  readiness  of  the  people  to 
fall  in  with  the  design  of  the  Spanish  intriguer ;  it  may 
be  contended  that  Henry  was  precipitate,  that  he  pre 
judged  the  Constitution  before  it  was  born,  and  that 
he  should  have  gone  to  Philadelphia,  where  he  could 
22  337 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

have  used  the  thunder-claps  of  his  eloquence  to  clear 
the  air  and  frighten  the  pygmy  Guardoquis  back  to 
Spain.  It  would  have  been  well,  indeed,  if  Henry  had 
made  his  fight  on  the  floor  of  the  Convention  hall. 
In  the  nature  of  things,  he  belonged  there.  But  he 
elected  to  remain  at  home ;  and  it  followed  that  he  would 
become  the  catechist  of  the  makers  of  the  Constitution — 
its  chief  critic  and  its  most  savage  assailant.  That  he 
finally  became  its  firm  and  faithful  friend  is  aside  from 
the  present  point. 

Washington  at  first  declined  to  go  to  the  Convention, 
but  his  reason  for  declining  was  altogether  different 
from  Henry's.  With  Henry,  liberty  was  an  emotion, 
a  passion ;  he  was  republican  to  the  core,  and  when 
stirred  was  intensely  imaginative.  He  and  Mason  still 
distrusted  the  old  aristocrats.  Theodore  Parker  says 
that  John  Adams  "  doubted  the  nation's  genius  " ;  and 
it  would  seem  at  times  that  Henry  and  Mason  were  less 
sure  of  the  people  than  they  should  have  been.  At  a 
later  period  than  the  one  we  are  now  considering,  Wash 
ington  was  almost  in  despair;  but  in  the  winter  of  1787 
he  was  disturbed  more  by  the  apprehension  that  the 
country  might  break  up  than  by  fears  of  aristocrats  or 
democrats  or  Guardoquis.  Foreign  nations,  he  said, 
"  must  see  and  feel  that  the  Union,  or  the  States  indi 
vidually,  are  sovereign,  as  best  suits  their  purposes;  in 
a  word,  that  we'  are  a  nation  to-day,  and  thirteen 
to-morrow.  Who  will  treat  with  us  on  such  terms  ?  " 
His  experiences  as  Commander-in-Chief  had  federalized 
him,  and  he  constantly  encouraged  Madison,  Randolph, 
Hamilton,  and  others  in  their  efforts  to  reform  the 
government.  But  he  had  declined  an  invitation  to  a 
spring  meeting  of  the  Cincinnati  in  Philadelphia,  and 
was  loath  to  offend  his  old  comrades  by  journeying 
thither  on  another  errand.  Therefore,  being  consid 
erate  and  punctilious,  he  refused  to  go  to  the  Convention 

338 


CHIEF  CRITIC  OF  THE  CONSTITUTION 

until  the  difficulty  was  removed.  This  accomplished,  he 
took  the  chair  in  Congress  Hall  on  the  25th  of  May, 
and  from  that  time  became  identified  with  the  new 
instrument,  and  it  with  him.  But  for  the  work  he  did 
upon  the  Constitution,  he  might  not  have  become  so 
attached  to  it.  But  for  the  enormous  prestige  he  gave 
it,  there  is  doubt  whether  it  could  have  lived.  Henry's 
substitute  in  the  Convention  was  Dr.  James  McClurg, 
of  Richmond.  McClurg  was  a  patriot,  a  "  character," 
and  a  true  man.  Mordecai  declares  that  he  was  "  the 
most  skilful  and  accomplished  medical  officer "  in  the 
Revolution.  He  was  devoted  to  Henry,  and  Henry  to 
him.  Madison,  Randolph,  and  Marshall  were  the  Vir 
ginia  Federalists,  while  Colonel  William  Grayson, 
Monroe,  and  Mason  were  staunch  State  Sovereignty 
men.  But  Mason  was  zealous  for  better  government. 
He  declared  that  he  would  "  bury  his  bones  in  Phila 
delphia  sooner  than  expose  his  country  to  a  dissolution 
of  the  Convention  without  anything  being  done." 
Edmund  Randolph  introduced  fifteen  resolutions  setting 
forth  the  "  Virginia  plan."  Nineteen  resolutions  based 
on  this  plan  were  reported  from  the  Committee  of  the 
Whole  on  the  I3th  of  June.  It  was  "  a  system  of  gov 
ernment  in  outline."  Two  days  later,  the  "  New  Jersey 
plan,"  proposing  amendments  to  the  existing  articles, 
was  introduced.  Four  days  after  that,  the  Committee 
reported  in  favor  of  the  "  Virginia  plan."  Then  came 
much  hard  work  and  much  in  the  way  of  heart-burn 
ings.  Finally  the  Constitution  was  agreed  to.  It  was 
signed  on  the  I7th  of  September,  and  among  the  sixteen 
deputies  who  refused  to  sign  it  were  Mason,  Randolph, 
and  Gerry.  Mason  said  that  he  would  "  sooner  chop 
off  his  right  hand  than  put  it  to  the  Constitution  as  it 
then  stood."  Franklin  said :  "  Several  parts  of  this 
Constitution  I  do  not  at  present  approve,  but  I  am  not 
sure  I  shall  never  approve  them.  It  astonishes  me  to 

339 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

find  this  system  approaching  so  near  to  perfection.  I 
assent  to  this  Constitution  because  I  expect  no  better, 
and  because  I  am  not  sure  it  is  not  the  best.  The 
opinions  I  have  had  of  its  errors  I  sacrifice  to  the  public 
good." 

Would  Henry  have  said  the  same  if  he  had  been 
present?  Hardly.  He  would  have  stood  with  Mason. 
Yet  Washington  still  hoped  that  Henry  might  be  in 
duced  to  countenance  the  new  government.  He  sent 
Henry  a  copy  of  the  Constitution  and  a  placatory  letter. 
He  was  at  pains  to  emphasize  the  compliment  by  for 
warding  it  "  in  the  first  moment  after  my  return  "  to 
Mount  Vernon.  In  his  reply  Henry  said :  "  I  have  to 
lament  that  I  cannot  bring  my  mind  to  accord  with  the 
proposed  Constitution.  The  concern  I  feel  on  this 
account  is  greater  than  I  can  express."  His  "  regard  " 
for  Washington  and  his  "  attachment "  to  him  would 
be  "unalterable,"  but . 

There  was  much  in  the  "  but."  Henry  was  now  in  the 
Legislature  as  a  member  from  Prince  Edward,  and  led 
the  House.  At  the  autumn  session  he  seemed  to  be 
training  himself  for  a  great  conflict  and  skirmishing 
for  position.  One  of  his  fiercest  and  most  prolonged 
debates  was  over  a  bill  repealing  acts  in  conflict  with 
the  treaty  of  peace.  He  opposed  it,  and  won,  on  the 
plea  that  repeal  should  be  contingent  upon  Great 
Britain's  compliance  in  the  premises.  Mason  worked 
with  Henry  on  the  grander  theme  then  agitating  the 
whole  country,  and  when  the  Legislature  adjourned  for 
the  session,  it  was  understood  that  the  battle  in  Virginia 
would  open  in  March,  1788,  when  the  people  would 
elect  delegates  to  ratify  or  reject  the  Federal  Consti 
tution. 

Henry  had  a  disagreeable  experience  in  the  prelimi 
naries.  Before  a  great  concourse  of  Prince  Edward 
people,  during  court-week  in  February,  he  offered  him- 

340 


CHIEF  CRITIC  OF  THE  CONSTITUTION 

self  as  a  candidate  for  the  Convention,  made  a  powerful 
speech,  and,  at  its  conclusion,  lingered  awhile  in  the 
throng,  expecting  a  Federalist  reply  from  John  Blair 
Smith,  the  distinguished  clergyman  and  orator,  then 
at  the  head  of  Hampden- Sidney  College.  But  Presi 
dent  Smith  was  kept  away  by  the  death  of  a  friend. 
Later,  when  Henry,  as  a  College  trustee,  was  present 
at  a  debate,  his  own  speech,  caught  in  short-hand,  was 
given  by  one  student  and  Smith's  reply  by  another. 
The  incident  caused  ill  feeling,  and  led  eventually  to 
President  Smith's  resignation.*  This,  however,  was 
but  one  of  numerous  happenings  of  a  bitter  spring. 
Henry  remarked  that  in  the  smaller,  eastern  counties 
aristocratic  Federal  delegates  were  being  chosen,  and 
in  the  larger,  western  counties  Anti-Federal  delegates. 
He  complained  of  Federal  tricks.  He  noted  that  by 
May  23  eight  States  had  adopted  the  Constitution,  and 
his  eagerness  to  begin  his  forensic  battle  added  to  the 
intensity  of  his  feeling.  As  he  was  about  to  leave 
Prince  Edward  Court-house  for  Richmond,  a  veteran 
fox-hunter  tapped  him  on  the  shoulder,  saying :  "  Old 
fellow,  stick  to  the  people !  If  you  take  the  back  track, 
we  are  gone." 

Finally  the  day  came.  It  was  Monday,  the  2d  of 
June,  and  the  Capitol — the  Old  Capitol — was  like  a 
hive.  So  great  was  the  crowd,  indeed,  that  on  the  fol 
lowing  day  the  Convention  assembled  in  a  larger 
audience  hall — that  of  the  New  Academy  on  Shockoe 
Hill.  Monumental  Church,  a  memorial  to  seventy-two 

*  An  anecdote  by  Grigsby  implies  that  Henry  and  Smith 
actually  met  in  debate.  Dr.  Smith  is  said  to  have  pressed  the 
question  upon  Henry  why  he  had  not  taken  his  seat  in  the 
Convention  and  lent  his  aid  in  making  a  good  Constitution, 
instead  of  staying  at  home  and  abusing  the  work  of  his  patriotic 
compeers.  Henry,  with  that  magical  power  of  acting  in  which 
he  excelled  all  his  contemporaries,  and  which  before  a  popular 
assembly  was  irresistible,  replied :  "  I  SMELL  A  RAT  !  " 

341 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

persons,  including  the  Governor  of  the  State,  who  per 
ished  in  a  theatre  fire  at  Christmas,  1811,  marks  the  site 
of  the  building.  Mordecai,  in  his  "  Richmond  in  By 
gone  Days,"  says  that  Chevalier  Quesnay  erected  the 
structure  used  by  the  Convention,  his  purpose  being 
to  found  an  Academy  of  the  Fine  Arts.  No  pictures 
that  could  have  been  hung  upon  its  walls,  even  though 
painted  by  a  West  or  a  Trumbull,  would  have  equalled 
the  actual  scene,  or  series  of  scenes,  now  framed  by 
those  walls  from  day  to  day.  We  may  well  think  of  the 
delegates  as  all  alive,  and  with  a  variety  of  mud-spatters 
on  their  stockings — red,  yellow,  black  splashes — and 
a  variety  of  dust  in  their  wigs ;  for  there  were  one 
hundred  and  seventy  of  them,  and  they  had  come  on 
wheels  or  on  horseback  along  many  roads,  from  every 
part  of  Virginia.*  Pendleton  presided;  but  when  the 

*  Hugh  Blair  Grigsby's  "  History  of  the  Virginia  Federal 
Convention  of  1788,"  edited  by  R.  A.  Brock,  is  to  be  found  in 
the  Virginia  Historical  Collections,  Vols.  IX  and  X.  -Grigsby 
paints  a  picture  of  the  arrival  at  Richmond  of  Henry  and 
Pendleton :  "  Though  not  personal  enemies,  they  rarely 
thought  alike  on  the  greatest  questions  of  that  age,  and  they 
came  aptly  enough  by  different  roads.  One  was  seen  advanc 
ing  from  the  south  side  of  the  James,  driving  a  pla1'-  and  top 
less  stick  gig.  He  was  tall,  and  seemed  capable  of  enduring 
fatigue,  but  was  bending  forward  as  if  worn  with  travel.  His 
dress  was  the  product  of  his  own  loom,  and  was  covered  with 
dust.  He  was  to  be  the  master-spirit  of  the  Convention.  The 
other  approached  from  the  north  side  of  the  river  in  an  elegant 
vehicle,  then  known  as  a  phaeton.  .  .  .  They  met  on  the  steps 
of  the  Swan  and  exchanged  salutations.  Public  expectation 
was  at  its  height  when  it  was  known  that  Patrick  Henry  and 
Edmund  Pendleton,  who  for  a  quarter  of  a  century  had  been  at 
the  head  of  the  two  great  parties  of  that  day,  were  about  to 
engage  in  another  fierce  conflict  in  the  councils  of  their  country." 
We  have  another  picture  of  Henry  and  Mason  walking  arm  in 
arm  from  the  Swan  to  the  Convention  hall — Mason  "  dressed  in 
a  full  suit  of  black,"  and  remarkable  for  the  "urbanity  and 
dignity  "  of  his  bearing. 

342 


CHIEF  CRITIC  OF  THE  CONSTITUTION 

Convention  sat  in  Committee  of  the  Whole,  as  it  usually 
did,  he  gave  Chancellor  Wythe  the  gavel  and  took  the 
floor,  that  he  might  chasten  the  logic  and  confute  the 
arguments  of  his  old-time  enemy.  David  Robertson, 
the  Petersburg  stenographer,  was  in  the  hall,  and,  with 
the  help  of  another  short-hand  writer,  hoped  to  take 
down  everything  that  was  said ;  but  he  was  given  "  an 
ineligible  seat."  Doubtless  he  could  hear  the  noisy 
robins  outside  better  than  he  could  some  of  the  speak 
ers.  He  admits  that  he  could  not  follow  Henry  in  his 
tremendous  flights.  Breaks  in  his  copy  indicate  as 
much ;  and  in  our  fancy  we  visualize  the  good  stenogra 
pher,  elbows  on  table,  quill  in  hand,  listening  with  all 
his  might — not  for  the  edification  of  the  curious  in 
times  to  come,  but  because  he  was  under  a  spell,  a  bit 
fascinated,  perhaps,  just  as  others  were  at  that  moment. 
A  lack  of  coherence  is  noted  in  some  of  the  reported 
speeches ;  the  logic  limps ;  evidently  it  was  no  easy 
task  to  put  upon  paper  a  literal  record  of  that  pro 
digious  disputation. 

Every  one  of  consequence  understood  the  issue.  It 
was  strict  Federalism,  with  new  and  nationalistic  attri 
butes,  against  a  loose  union  of  local  governments. 
Every  one  of  clear  comprehension  understood  the  bind 
ing  effect  of  the  final  yea  and  nay.  Madison  was  blunt, 
but  not  too  blunt,  when  he  declared :  "  The  Constitu 
tion  requires  an  adoption  in  toto  and  forever."  Many 
of  the  members  likewise  appreciated  the  dramatic  aspects 
of  this  grand  game  in  fundamental  politics.  The  New 
York  Convention  was  to  meet  on  the  I7th  and  the  New 
Hampshire  Convention  on  the  i8th,  and  the  news  of 
the  three  was  to  be  borne  to  and  fro  by  men  riding 
express.  It  was  a  device  set  up  by  Hamilton  and  Mad 
ison,  with  the  idea  that  they  might  thus  be  able  to  utilize 
the  inspiriting  effect  of  a  victory  in  one  State  to  win 
votes  in  another.  So  do  generals  in  a  critical  campaign 

343 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

send  off  their  couriers  breakneck  and  sound  their  fan 
fares  to  animate  their  men.  Henry's  party  had  no  such 
arrangement ;  yet  the  Anti-Constitutionalists  were  active 
indoors  and  out.  Mason  was  chairman  of  the  Virginia 
branch  of  the  "  Federal  Republicans,"  a  society  organ 
ized  in  New  York,  under  the  guidance  of  General  John 
Lamb,  with  whom  Henry  was  in  correspondence.  Its 
purpose  was  to  bring  the  amendments  to  be  proposed 
in  the  several  States  into  close  order  and  uniformity, 
so  that  they  might  constitute  a  rear  line  of  intrench- 
ments  in  the  event  of  defeat  at  the  outstart  of  battle. 

Though  not  present  in  person,  Washington  was  the 
leader  of  the  Federalists  in  the  Richmond  struggle. 
His  spirit  was  there.  His  line  of  battle  contained 
Madison,  Randolph,  Marshall,  Pendleton,  Wythe, 
Wilson  Nicholas,  George  Nicholas,  Corbin,  Innes,  and 
"  Dragoon  Harry  "  Lee.  Henry's  was  held  very  largely 
by  himself,  but  a  great  man  stood  with  him  whenever 
Mason  rose  to  speak,  and  they  counted  among  their 
supporters  Monroe,  Tyler,  Dawson,  Grayson,  Harrison, 
and  other  orators  and  logicians  of  high  repute. 

It  was  agreed  to  take  up  the  Constitution  clause  by 
clause;  but  in  a  little  while  it  became  apparent  that  a 
wiser  way  was  to  place  no  check  upon  the  speakers, 
who  were  given  the  widest  latitude.  Wilson  Nicholas 
opened  the  debate ;  Henry  followed  him ;  then  came 
Randolph ;  then  Mason ;  then  Madison.  They  all  slept 
on  the  theme,  and  next  morning  Pendleton  and  Lee 
led  off,  after  which  Henry  again  took  the  floor.  And 
so  it  went  for  twenty-three  days,  Henry  speaking  on 
eighteen.  "  On  each  of  several  days,"  says  Tyler,  "  he 
made  three  speeches ;  on  one  day,  he  made  five  speeches ; 
on  another  day,  eight.  In  one  speech  alone  he  was  on 
his  legs  for  seven  hours."  In  Jonathan  Elliot's  five- 
volume  collection  of  ratification  debates,  the  third  vol 
ume,  of  six  hundred  and  sixty-three  pages,  is  devoted 

344 


CHIEF  CRITIC  OF  THE  CONSTITUTION 

to  those  in  Virginia,  and  Henry's  speeches  take  up 
nearly  one-fourth  of  the  book.  In  one  instance  a  speech 
is  spread  out  upon  forty  pages. 

Henry  declared  himself  a  Unionist.  "  I  mean  not 
to  breathe  the  spirit  nor  utter  the  language  of  secession," 
said  he.  "  Separate  confederacies  will  ruin  us.  ... 
Sir,  the  dissolution  of  the  Union  is  most  abhorrent  to 
my  mind.  The  first  thing  I  have  at  heart  is  American 
liberty;  the  second  thing  is  American  union."  He  set 
great  store  by  what  had  been  gained.  "  The  voice  of 
tradition,  I  trust,  will  inform  posterity  of  our  struggles 
for  freedom."  Might  not  the  fruits  of  the  struggle 
be  lost?  He  was  suspicious — he  admitted  his  suspicion. 
"  But,  sir,  suspicion  is  a  virtue  as  long  as  its  object 
is  the  preservation  of  the  public  good."  Others  like 
wise  were  filled  with  grave  mistrust,  with  foreboding. 
"  I  speak  as  one  poor  individual — but  when  I  speak, 
I  speak  the  language  of  thousands.  .  .  .  I  see  great 
jeopardy  in  this  new  government;  I  see  none  from  our 
present  one.  The  Confederation — this  same  despised 
government — merits,  in  my  opinion,  the  highest  enco 
mium  ;  it  carried  us  through  a  long  and  dangerous  war ; 
it  rendered  us  victorious  in  that  bloody  conflict  with  a 
powerful  nation;  it  has  secured  us  territory  greater 
than  any  European  monarch  possesses:  and  shall  a 
government  which  has  been  thus  strong  and  vigorous 
be  accused  of  imbecility  and  abandoned  for  want  of 
energy  ?  "  But  granted  that  some  change  was  neces 
sary.  "  The  Federal  Convention  ought  to  have  amended 
the  old  system — for  this  purpose  they  were  solely  dele 
gated."  Given  an  inch,  they  had  taken  an  ell.  He 
demanded  the  cause  of  their  conduct.  "  Even  from 
that  illustrious  man  who  saved  us  by  his  valor,  I  would 
have  a  reason  for  his  conduct — that  liberty  which  he 
has  given  us  by  his  valor  tells  me  to  ask  this  reason. 
.  .  .  The  distinction  between  a  National  Govern- 

345 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

ment  and  a  Confederacy  is  not  sufficiently  discerned. 
Had  the  delegates  who  were  sent  to  Philadelphia  a 
power  to  propose  a  Consolidated  Government  instead 
of  a  Confederacy  ?  .  .  .  Have  they  said  '  We,  the 
States '  ?  Have  they  made  a  proposal  of  compact 
between  the  States  ?  If  they  had,  this  would  be  a  Con 
federation  :  it  is  otherwise  most  clearly  a  Consolidated 
Government.  The  question,  sir,  turns  on  that  poor 
little  thing,  '  We,  the  People'  instead  of  the  States, 
'  of  America.'  ...  A  number  of  characters,  of  the 
greatest  eminence  in  this  country,  object  to  this  gov 
ernment  for  its  consolidating  tendency.  This  is  not 
imaginary.  It  is  a  formidable  reality.  .  .  .  This 
government  will  operate  like  an  ambuscade.  It  will 
destroy  the  State  governments,  and  swallow  the  liber 
ties  of  the  people.  .  .  .If  gentlemen  are  willing 
to  run  the  hazard,  let  them  run  it ;  but  I  shall  exculpate 
myself  by  my  opposition  and  monitory  warnings  within 
these  walls.  .  .  .  Here  is  a  revolution  as  radical  as 
that  which  separated  us  from  Great  Britain.  It  is  as 
radical  if,  in  this  transition,  our  rights  and  privileges 
are  endangered  and  the  sovereignty  of  the  States  shall 
be  relinquished.  The  rights  of  conscience,  trial  by 
jury,  liberty  of  the  press,  all  your  immunities  and 
franchises,  all  pretensions  to  human  rights  and  privi 
leges,  are  rendered  insecure,  if  not  lost,  by  this  change, 
so  loudly  talked  of  by  some,  so  inconsiderately  by  others. 
.  .  .  You  ought  to  be  extremely  cautious,  watchful, 
jealous  of  your  liberty;  instead  of  securing  your  rights, 
you  may  lose  them  forever.  If  a  wrong  step  be  now 
made,  the  Republic  may  be  lost  forever."  Let  the  new 
plan  be  examined  minutely.  Here  is  delegated  "  a 
power  of  direct  taxation,  unbounded  and  unlimited. 

.     Your  militia  is  given  up  to  Congress. 
My  great  objection  to  this  government  is  that  it  does 
not  leave  us  the  means  of  defending  our  rights,  or  of 

346 


CHIEF  CRITIC  OF  THE  CONSTITUTION 

waging  war  against  tyrants.  .  .  .  Will  the  op 
pressor  let  go  the  oppressed?  Was  there  ever  an 
instance?  Can  the  annals  of  mankind  exhibit  one  single 
sxainple?"  We  may  amend  the  Constitution,  but  one- 
tenth  an  defeat  all  amendment.  "  We  drew  the  spirit 
berty  from  our  British  ancestors;  by  that  spirit 
v.e  have  triumphed  over  every  difficulty.  But  now, 
sir,  the  American  spirit,  assisted  by  the  ropes  and 
chains  of  consolidation,  is  about  to  convert  this  country 
into  a  ;  \verful  and  mighty  empire.  ...  If  your 
AmenV-'  >  ;:hief  be  a  man  of  ambition  and  abilities,  how 
easy  it  ;s  lor  him  to  render  himself  absolute!  .  .  . 
What  will  then  become  of  you  and  your  rights?  Will 
not  ab.s<.-ii.ie  despotism  ensue?"  And  the  Senators  of 
this  spk'iK.ul  government,  would  they  not  be  corrupted 
— would  not  sell  themselves  to  those  who  had 

cause  to  buy  them?  But  there  will  be  luminous 
characters  to  conduct  the  Federal  Government.  "  It 
will  not  avail  unless  this  luminous  breed  be  propagated 
from  generation  to  generation ;  and  even  then,  if  the 
number  of  vicious  characters  preponderate,  you  are 
undone.  .  .  .  You  will  sip  sorrow "  if  you  give 
away  your  rights.  *'  Congress,  by  the  power  of  taxation 
and  by  their  control  over  the  militia,  have  the  sword  in 
one  hand  and  the  purse  in  the  other.  Shall  we  be  safe 
without  either?  When  did  freedom  exist  when  the 
sword  and  purse  were  given  up  from  the  people? 
Unless  a  miracle  in  human  affairs  interposed,  no  nation 
ever  retained  its  liberty  after  the  loss  of  the  sword 
and  purse."  There  must  be  a  Bill  of  Rights.  Why 
not?  They  should  be  written  down  and  solemnly  sub 
scribed  to.  Why  leave  anything  to  chance?  Law  in 
Virginia  was  no  law  at  all  if  it  was  contrary  to  their 
own  Bill  of  Rights.  "  If  you  give  up  these  powers 
without  a  Bill  of  Rights,  you  will  exhibit  the  most 
absurd  thing  to  mankind  the  world  ever  saw,  a  gov- 

347 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

ernment  that  has  abandoned  all  its  powers — the  power 
of  a  direct  taxation,  the  sword  and  the  purse.  You 
have  disposed  of  them  to  Congress  without  a  Bill  of 
Rights — without  check,  limitation,  or  control.  .  .  . 
You  have  a  Bill  of  Rights  to  defend  you  against  the 
State  government,  which  is  bereft  of  all  power;  and 
yet  you  have  none  against  Congress,  though  in  full 
and  exclusive  possession  of  all  power.  ...  If  you 
will  in  the  language  of  freemen  stipulate  that  there 
are  rights  which  no  man  under  heaven  can  take  from 
you,  you  shall  have  me  going  along  with  you — not 
otherwise."  But  the  Constitution  as  it  stands  "  has  an 
awful  squinting;  it  squints  towards  monarchy.  And 
does  not  this  raise  indignation  in  the  breast  of  every 
true  American?  Your  President  may  easily  become 
King.  .  .  .  No,  sir,  I  have  not  said  the  one  hun 
dred  thousandth  part  of  what  I  have  on  my  mind. 
.  .  .  It  is  impiously  irritating  the  avenging  hand 
of  heaven  when  a  people  who  are  in  the  full  enjoyment 
of  freedom  launch  out  into  the  wide  ocean  of  human 
affairs,  and  desert  those  maxims  which  alone  can  pre 
serve  liberty." 

Such  was  the  spirit  and  such  the  burden  of  Henry's 
tremendous  outpouring.  But,  in  thus  cdmpressing 
some  tens  of  thousands  of  words  into  a  few  hundred, 
we  have  been  unable,  of  course,  to  follow  his  full  and 
orderly  line  of  thought — sustained,  as  it  was,  hour  after 
hour,  day  after  day.  Nor  have  we  successfully  indi 
cated  the  multitude  of  analogies  and  facts  used  by  him 
to  exemplify  or  clinch  his  arguments.  He  frequently 
referred  to  the  attempt  to  close  the  Mississippi  River — 
a  burning  matter  with  him.  He  discussed  the  govern 
ments  of  Europe,  which  he  said  was  "  enslaved  by  the 
hands  of  its  own  people,"  and  he  eulogized  the  British 
government.  He  spoke  upon  the  danger  of  secrecy 
in  Congress,  and  enlarged  upon  elections,  the  judi- 

348 


CHIEF  CRITIC  OF  THE  CONSTITUTION 

ciary,  paper  money,  and  British  debts.  There  should 
be  checks  on  the  treaty-making.  Checks  and  balances 
should  be  provided  wherever  there  was  likelihood  that 
the  liberties  of  the  people  would  be  infringed. 

As  with  Mason,  Henry's  mind  constantly  went  back 
to  the  period  of  struggle  prior  to  the  Revolution.  Many 
wise  words  were  spoken  during  the  debates,  and  not 
a  few  of  them  by  Mason.  Because  he  had  made  a  life 
study  of  the  subject,  it  was  easy  for  him  to  clothe  an 
elusive  and  abstruse  governmental  truth  in  simple  words 
that  made  it  plain  and  incontrovertible;  but  it  was 
hard  for  him,  just  as  it  was  for  Henry,  to  get  away 
from  the  thoughts  that  had  dominated  him  in  more 
heroic  days. 

Pendleton,  who  held  that  the  people,  not  the  States, 
were  "  the  fountain  of  power,"  assured  them  that  "  there 
was  no  quarrel  between  government  and  liberty."  He 
tried  to  make  them  forget  the  pre-Revolutionary  fight, 
and  imagine  that  the  Constitution  before  them  "  had 
dropped  from  one  of  the  planets."  If  so,  it  would  be 
looked  at  and  admired.  The  Confederation  was  of 
slight  account.  It  was  the  American  spirit  that  had  won 
the  Revolution.  "  From  Congress  to  the  drunken  car 
penter,"  the  people  had  cried,  "  United  we  stand  " ;  and 
that  was  why  victory  had  come. 

Pendleton  was  a  close  reasoner,  but  Madison  was 
the  master-spirit  among  the  Federalists.  Like  Marshall, 
he  was  a  temperate  disputant,  with  an  habitual  appeal 
to  sound  sense;  but,  aside  from  his  skill  in  dialectics, 
he  was  armed  at  all  points  because  of  his  specialization 
along  present  lines,  and  also  because  of  his  abiding  faith 
in  the  instrument  before  them. 

We  have  said  that  wise  words  were  spoken.  "  What 
are  the  favorite  maxims  of  democracy  ?  "  asked  Mar 
shall  ;  and  he  answered :  "  A  strict  observance  of  public 
faith  and  a  steady  adherence  to  virtue.  These,  sir,  are 

349 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

the  principles  of  a  good  government.  No  mischief,  no 
misfortune,  ought  to  deter  us  from  a  strict  observance 
of  justice  and  the  public  faith."  But  immediately, 
and  with  lack  of  wisdom,  Marshall  attacked  Henry  on 
the  score  of  a  happening  when  the  Revolution  was  in 
progress.  Randolph  joined  in  the  attack;  and,  strange 
to  say,  Henry's  defence  of  himself  was  less  effective 
than  a  simple  recital  of  the  facts  would  have  been. 
The  implication  was  that  Henry  and  the  Legislature 
were  to  blame  for  attainting  a  Tory  outlaw  of  the  Great 
Dismal,  one  Josiah  Philips.  This  man  was  a  war-time 
bandit,  at  the  head  of  a  gang  of  desperadoes  who  eluded 
the  militia  by  hiding  in  the  swamp  in  daylight,  after 
striking  defenceless  points  at  night.  Henry  wrote  to 
the  Speaker  of  the  House  about  him,  and  the  Assembly, 
on  its  own  initiative,  passed  a  bill  of  attainder,  notify 
ing  the  bandits  that  if  they  failed  to  surrender  within  a 
month,  they  stood  attainted  of  treason  and  should  suffer 
death.  Philips  was  caught,  tried  for  highway  robbery 
— not  treason — and  hanged.  But  in  the  Convention 
Henry  failed  to  recall  the  actual  facts ;  and  Randolph, 
who  had  tried  the  man,  also  made  the  strange  blunder 
of  scoring  Henry  for  an  act  of  injustice  in  putting  a 
man  to  death  under  a  bill  of  attainder.  The  Homers, 
it  seems,  were  all  nodding. 

But  Henry  was  not  nodding  when  George  Nicholas 
intimated  that  certain  land  transactions  in  which  various 
gentlemen  had  engaged  were  not  as  they  should  have 
been.  It  was  probably  intended  as  a  grazing  shot.  "  I 
mean  what  I  say,  sir !  "  said  Nicholas,  angrily,  when 
called  to  account ;  but  Henry,  who  had  in  his  time  bought 
a  great  deal  of  land,  and  who  might  therefore  be  mis 
judged  in  this  connection  by  delegates  from  distant 
parts,  forced  Nicholas  to  apologize.  "  I  hold  what  I 
hold  in  right,  and  in  a  just  manner,"  said  Henry;  and 
the  Convention  stood  convinced. 


CHIEF  CRITIC  OF  THE  CONSTITUTION 

There  were  other  personalities.  The  contention  at 
times  was  sharp.  No  point  was  lost.  Believing  as  he 
did  that  there  was  "  poison  under  the  wings  of  the 
Constitution/'  Henry  fought  with  every  legitimate 
weapon. 

Now,  it  so  happened  that  Randolph,  in  particular, 
repeatedly  invited  attack.  He  had  laid  himself  open  to 
it  by  his  shifting  course ;  for,  though  he  had  refused  to 
sign  the  paper  at  Philadelphia,  he  now  acted  as  if  he 
regarded  himself  as  its  chief  champion  and  wished  others 
to  so  regard  him.  This  was  too  much  for  Henry,  who, 
with  cutting  sarcasm,  naming  no  names,  called  attention 
to  the  inconsistency.  Randolph  was  "  touched  to  the 
quick,"  and  cried  out :  "  I  find  myself  attacked  in  the 
most  illiberal  manner  by  the  honorable  gentleman.  I 
disdain  his  aspersions  and  insinuations.  His  asperity 
is  warranted  by  no  principle  of  parliamentary  decency, 
nor  compatible  with  the  least  shadow  of  friendship ; 
and  if  our  friendship  must  fall,  let  it  fall  like  Lucifer, 
never  to  rise  again !  "  There  was  so  much  excitement 
that  the  reporter  used  his  eyes  and  ears,  but  forgot  to 
use  the  hand  in  which  he  held  his  quill.  He  noted, 
however,  that  Randolph  threatened  to  disclose  certain 
facts  that  would  make  "  some  men's  hair  stand  on  end." 
Henry  demanded  immediate  disclosure  on  the  Conven 
tion  floor ;  but  Randolph's  threat  was  evidently  idle, 
probably  originating  in  a  baseless  tavern  tale;  and  he 
refused  to  reveal  what /it  was  with  which  he  proposed  to 
bring  about  this  horripill'tipn.  But  a  duel  was  looked 
for.  Roane  says  that  Hehr^^Galled  on  Randolph,  "  with 
old  Will  Cabell  as  his  friend/adding:  "I  heard  the 
latter  say  that  Mr.  Henry  acted  with  great  firmness  and 
propriety.  He  let  Mr.  Randolph  down,  however,  pretty 
easily,  owing  to  the  extreme  benignity  of  his  disposi 
tion."  * 

*  In  a  letter  to  Judge  Carr,  Wirt  speaks  of  "  some  ugly  traits 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

This  and  other  incidents,  one  of  which  shows  us 
Henry  as  a  solicitous  father,  even  when  absorbed  in 
his  great  public  work,  serve  to  bring  us  close  to  the 
man.  William  Wirt  Henry,  telling  of  the  impressive 
speech  of  the  5th  of  June,  says : 

"  In  the  midst  of  his  argument  he  recognized  the  face  of 
his  son,  whom  he  had  left  to  protect  his  family  in  his  absence, 
and  he  knew  that  some  important  domestic  event  had  brought 
him  to  Richmond.  He  hesitated  a  moment,  stooped  down, 
and  with  a  full  heart  whispered  to  a  friend  near  him :  '  Daw- 
son,  I  see  my  son  in  the  hall ;  take  him  out.'  Mr.  Dawson 
at  once  withdrew  with  young  Henry,  and  soon  returned 
with  the  grateful  intelligence  that  Mrs.  Henry  had  given  birth 
to  a  son,  and  that  both  mother  and  child  were  doing  well. 
The  new-born  babe  was  named  Alexander  Spotswood,  and 
lived  to  be  familiar  with  his  father's  features  and  to  enjoy 
his  fame,  and  at  the  age  of  sixty-five  was  laid  by  his  side  in 
the  quiet  burial-ground  at  Red  Hill." 

On  this  5th  of  June,  as  we  learn  from  the  "  Life 
of  Archibald  Alexander,"  the  distinguished  General 
Thomas  Posey  was  so  carried  away  by  Henry's  elo 
quence  that  he  made  up  his  mind  then  and  there  not  to 
vote  for  ratification.  But  no  sooner  had  he  got  out 
from  under  the  magical  spell  of  the  orator  than  he  began 
to  see  the  matter  exactly  as  he  had  seen  it  before. 
Grigsby  assures  us  that  when  Henry  dwelt  upon  the  way 
a  tyrant  in  the  Presidency  might  in  time  shackle  the 
common  people,  Mr.  Best,  of  Nansemond,  "  involun 
tarily  felt  his  wrists  to  assure  himself  that  the  fetters 

in  Henry's  character  "  ;  but  he  was  thinking  of  Henry's*  politics. 
Elsewhere  he  said  that  he  had  set  down  against  Henry 
everything  known  to  him  of  a  derogatory  nature.  Practically 
he  gave  us-  nothing  of  consequence  reflecting  upon  Henry, 
because  there  was  nothing  to  give.  Though  Wirt's  book  was 
"  a  labor  of  love,"  he  was  glad  when  he  had  finished  it.  "  As 
for  Patrick — he  is  the  very  toughest  subject  I  ever  coped  withal. 
.  .  Many  a  weary  league  have  I  travelled  with  old 
Patrick." 

352 


CHIEF  CRITIC  OF  THE  CONSTITUTION 

were  not  already  pressing  his  flesh."  Moreover,  Best 
used  to  say  that  "  the  gallery  in  which  he  sat  seemed 
to  become  as  dark  as  a  dungeon."  *  So  many  of  Henry's 
hearers  affirmed  as  to  his  exceeding  power  in  this 
oratorical  particular  that  it  should  be  accepted  as  beyond 
question.  He  could  take  a  man's  spirit  out  of  him  and 
absolutely  charm  it.  But  Chief-Justice  Marshall  wished 
it  to  be  understood  that  Henry  was  not  an  orator  as  we 
usually  take  the  word.  He  was  much  more  than  that, 
said  Marshall ;  he  was  "  a  learned  lawyer,  a  most 
accurate  thinker,  and  a  profound  reasoner.  If  I  were 
called  upon  to  say  who  of  all  the  men  I  have  known  had 
the  greatest  power  to  convince,  I  should  perhaps  say 
Mr.  Madison,  while  Mr.  Henry  had  without  doubt  the 
greatest  power  to  persuade."  It  is  interesting  to  note 
that  this  verdict  by  the  illustrious  Chief-Justice  came 
down  to  us  from  the  lips  of  Judge  John  Scott  ("  Barba- 
rossa  "),  author  of  "  The  Lost  Principle,  or  the  Sectional 
Equilibrium." 

By  the  23d  of  June  the  Federalists  had  decided  that  it 
would  be  unwise  to  come  to  a  vote  without  making  a 
concession  as  to  amendments.  Accordingly,  Chancellor 
Wythe  left  the  chair  next  day,  and,  in  behalf  of  the 
Madison  party,  proposed  that  Virginia  should  ratify, 

*  Grigsby  says :  "  I  was  told  by  a  person  on  the  floor  of  the 
Convention  at  the  time,  that  when  Henry  had  painted  in  the 
most  vivid  colors  the  dangers  likely  to  result  to  the  black 
population  from  the  unlimited  power  of  the  general  govern 
ment  wielded  by  men  who  had  little  or  no  interest  in  that 
species  of  property,  and  had  filled  his  audience  with  fear,  he 
suddenly  broke  out  with  the  homely  exclamation :  '  They'll 
free  your  niggers! '  The  audience  passed  instantly  from  fear 
to  wayward  laughter;  and  my  informant  said  that  it  was  most 
ludicrous  to  see  men,  who  a  moment  before  were  half  fright 
ened  to  death,  with  a  broad  grin  on  their  faces."  Here  is 
another  Grigsby  note :  "  I  have  heard  Governor  Tazewell  say 
that  he  has  seen  Henry  in  animated  debate  twirl  his  wig 
several  times  in  rapid  succession." 

23  353 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

with  a  recommendation  to  amend.  Henry  put  forward 
a  substitute  demanding  prior  amendments  and  a  Bill 
of  Rights.  This  at  once  re-precipitated  vigorous  combat, 
which  lasted  for  two  days.  Henry  spoke  three  times. 
The  second  speech — that  of  the  24th  of  June — is  famous 
as  "  the  thunder-storm  oration."  Following  Madison, 
Henry  made  an  appeal  in  which  he  seemed  to  surpass 
himself.  With  infectious  solemnity  he  reiterated  his 
fears  that  the  new  bond  would  bring  woe  upon  the  land. 
He  called  upon  the  powers  above  to  illumine  the  darkness 
and  show  to  all  the  imperfections  of  the  instrument 
before  them.  "  I  see/'  he  cried,  "  the  awful  immensity 
of  the  dangers  with  which  it  is  pregnant.  I  see  it.  I 
feel  it.  I  see  beings  of  a  higher  order  anxious  concern 
ing  our  decision." 

"  When,  lo ! "  says  Wirt,  "  a  storm  at  that  instant  rose, 
which  shook  the  whole  building,  and  the  spirits  he  had  called 
seemed  to  come  at  his  bidding.  Nor  did  his  eloquence  or 
the  storm  immediately  cease ;  but  availing  himself  of  the 
incident  with  a  master's  art,  he  seemed  to  mix  in  the  fight 
of  his  ethereal  auxiliaries,  and,  '  rising  on  the  wings  of  the 
tempest,  to  seize  upon  the  artillery  of  heaven,  and  direct  its 
fiercest  thunders  against  the  heads  of  his  adversaries.'  The 
scene  became  insupportable ;  and  the  House  rose  without  the 
formality  of  an  adjournment,  the  members  rushing  from  their 
seats  with  precipitation  and  confusion." 

At  the  outset  the  Federalists  had  counted  upon  a 
majority  of  fifty.  Now  Madison  was  concerned  lest 
he  get  no  majority  at  all.  On  the  day  following  trie 
storm-scene,  he  closed  his  contention  with  the  words: 
"  Let  us  join  with  cordiality  in  those  alterations  we 
think  proper.  There  is  no  friend  to  the  Constitution 
but  will  concur  in  that  mode."  Henry  said  that  whether 
he  should  win  or  lose,  he  would  be  "  a  peaceable  citi 
zen."  He  added :  "  My  head,  my  hand,  my  heart,  shall 
be  at  liberty  to  retrieve  the  loss  of  liberty,  and  to  remove 

354 


CHIEF  CRITIC  OF  THE  CONSTITUTION 

the  defects  of  that  system  in  a  constitutional  way."  His 
resolution  was  voted  down,  88  to  80;  Wythe's  carried, 
89  to  79.  And  thus  ended  a  Convention  which,  as  Rives 
expresses  it,  was  "  second  in  importance  only  to  that 
which  produced  a  Constitution." 

jArnauld,  in  his  "  Logic,"  as  cited  by  Sainte-Beuve, 
saysT  "  The  greater  part  of  men's  errors  come  less 
because  they  reason  ill  on  true  principles  than  because 
they  reason  well  on  false  ones."  Was  Henry  arguing 
upon  false  principles  in  this  great  debate?  If  Socialism, 
sweeping  down  upon  us  in  a  time  of  wide-spread  stag 
nation,  should  overturn  our  government,  and  then 
should  itself  fail  and  fall  away,  would  a  Henry  argue 
for  a  return  to  State  Sovereignty  or  a  return  to  the 
Nationalism  of  the  present?  Were  Henry  alive  at  such 
a  crisis,  he  would  say :  "  The  Federal  Constitution, 
as  amended,  as  interpreted,  as  put  to  the  proof  by  time, 
is  the  great  shield  for  us  all.  In  its  embryo  shape,  it 
did  not  suit  some  of  us.  But  since  that  day  a  thousand 
things  have  happened.  Conditions  have  changed.  Man 
kind  is  knit  together  from  sea  to  sea.  It  is  marvellous." 
Of  the  forty-five  States,  Henry  would  remark  that 
thirty-two  are  veritable  children  of  the  Constitution. 
He  would  see  that  their  Federal  ties,  were  filial  and 
complete.  War,  that  potent  logician  which  in  1788  had 
developed  State  Sovereignty  in  its  full  pride  before  his 
eyes,  had  in  1861  subdued  that  pride — and  this,  too, 
he  would  note,  recalling  as  he  did  so  that  he  had  felt 
the  threat  of  it  and  the  ache  of  it  in  his  prophetic  bones. 
He  would  observe  that  within  their  spheres  the  States 
still  retain  their  functional  rights.  Surprise  would  be 
his,  and  pleasure.? 

In  the  Convention  of  1788,  Henry  voiced  the  solemn 
conviction  of  nearly  half  the  people  of  the  United  States. 
Lowndes,  of  South  Carolina,  wished  his  epitaph  to  be : 
"  Here  lies  the  man  that  opposed  the  Constitution, 

355 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

because  it  was  ruinous  to  the  liberty  of  America." 
Luther  Martin,  of  Maryland,  was  absolutely  sincere 
when  he  said  that  he  would  be  willing  to  become  a 
pauper  if  by  so  doing  he  could  save  his  country  from 
an  experiment  fraught  with  peril.  The  Federalist 
papers  of  Madison,  Hamilton,  and  Jay  had  not  as  yet 
produced  their  effect.  (Henry,  in  a  word,  was  by  no 
means  the  only  "  nervous  patriot "  in  America.  Pro 
foundly  enamored  of  liberty,  it  was  natural  that  he 
should  apprehend  numerous  evils  which  never  arose. 
Liberty  and  civil  security  constituted  his  postulate  in 
the  Convention  debates.  Fundamentally,  therefore,  he 
was  sound.  Aside  from  his  general  distrust  of  a  con 
solidated  government  and  from  his  failure  to  foresee 
the  miraculous  fruitage  of  civilization  on  these  shores 
— which  he  himself  had  helped  to  make  brighter  in  the 
eyes  of  mankind,  magnetic,  indeed,  to  mankind — his 
mistakes  were  the  minor  mistakes  of  extravagant  utter 
ance.  He  was  in  the  position  of  an  advocate,  a  fiery 
disputant.  He  was  intense  in  his  nature,  and  imaginative 
in  high  degree.  He  used  his  imagination  because  he 
wished  to  stir  the  thoughts  of  men  of  colder  tempera 
ment,  meaning  to  conjure  up  and  prefigure  and  pre- 
examine  alljiiat  might  come  to  pass  subversive  of  the 
common  weal.J 

It  has  fjeensaid  *  that  after  the  adoption  of  the  Con 
stitution  Henry  declared  he  "  '  would  have  nothing  to 
do  with  it,'  and  fell  for  a  time  so  completely  out  of  touch 
with  his  countrymen  that  he  not  only  refused  to  embark 
his  political  fortunes  in  what  he  called  '  the  crazy 
machine '  of  the  Federal  Government,  but  became  so 
disaffected  to  the  new  polity  that,  in  the  first  flush  of 
his  disgust,  he  thought  of  emigrating  to  North  Carolina, 
where  he  would  be  outside  the  more  perfect  Union, 

*  The  Nation,  vol.  liv. 
356 


CHIEF  CRITIC  OF  THE  CONSTITUTION 

inasmuch  as  that  State,  sharing  his  fears,  and,  as 
some  charged,  following  his  lead,  had  at  first  rejected 
the  Constitution.  At  a  later  date,  when  North  Carolina 
had  acceded  to  the  Union,  he  joined  with  some  land 
companies  in  the  purchase  of  vast  demesnes  in  the 
remote  and  unsettled  parts  of  Georgia — the  tract 
bought  by  all  the  companies  comprising  15,000,0x30 
acres — not  only,  as  he  confessed,  from  motives  of 
speculation,  but  also  from  a  wish  to  get  on  the  frontier 
of  the  consolidated  government." 

We  may  well  believe  that  Henry  wished  to  get  on  the 
frontier,  whether  it  were  the  borderland  of  a  consoli 
dated  set  of  former  sovereignties,  or  the  edge  of  an 
honest  wilderness  fringed  with  democracy ;  but  it  does 
not  appear  that  politics  had  a  great  deal  to  do  with  his 
land  ventures,  or  that  he  at  any  time  harbored  serious 
thoughts  of  sulking  in  some  hermit  hut  down  among 
the  Cherokees.  His  reference  to  "  the  crazy  machine  " 
was  in  a  letter  to  Monroe,  to  whom  he  wrote :  "  And 
although  the  form  of  government  in  which  my  country 
men  determined  to  place  themselves  had  my  enmity, 
yet,  as  we  are  one  and  all  embarked,  it  is  natural  to 
care  for  the  crazy  machine — at  least,  so  long  as  we 
are  out  of  sight  of  port  to  refit."  He  simply  regarded 
the  Ship  of  State  as  unsuited  for  that  long  voyage  she 
was  destined  to  undertake ;  and,  for  the  good  of  those 
on  board,  he  hoped  to  see  her  rigged  differently,  caulked 
with  George  Mason's  sterling  oakum,  made  taut  from 
stem  to  stern,  and  then  refloated  under  the  flag  of  the 
free.  His  recusancy  was  indeed  persistent  and  at  times 
bitter,  but  it  was  consistently  patriotic.  In  proof  of  this 
we  have  the  word  of  Richard  Venable,  who  was  at  a 
meeting  of  the  Anti-Federalist  delegates  on  the  evening 
of  their  defeat.  Among  them  were  some  revolters 
who  proposed  to  concert  a  plan  of  resistance  to  the 
new  government;  but  Henry  at  once  struck  down  their 

357 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

standard.  David  Meade  Randolph  corroborates  Ven- 
able.  According  to  Randolph,  Henry  said  "  he  had 
done  his  duty  strenuously  in  opposing  the  Constitution, 
in  the  proper  place,  and  with  all  the  powers  he  pos 
sessed.  The  question  had  been  fully  discussed  and 
settled."  Therefore,  "  as  true  and  faithful  republicans, 
they  had  all  better  go  home ;  they  should  cherish  it  and 
give  it  fair  play — support  it,  too." 

Acting  upon  Henry's  advice,  the  Anti-Federalists 
thereafter  moved  along  legitimate  lines  of  opposition, 
agitating  for  amendments.  Henry  in  Virginia  and 
Clinton  in  New  York  knew  that  the  amendments  would 
never  be  embodied  in  the  Constitution  unless  the  Fed 
eralists  should  be  forced  to  put  them  there.  A  mild 
and  unurgent  campaign  would  signify  surrender;  by 
sharp  and  zealous  labor  only  could  Madison  and  Hamil 
ton  be  brought  to  book. 

It  was  Clinton's  idea  that  a  general  convention  should 
take  up  the  numerous  amendments  proposed,  and  Henry 
fell  in  with  the  plan.  By  midsummer  the  Federalist 
leaders  were  alarmed.  Madison  thought  that  the  Clinton 
programme  had  "  a  most  pestilent  tendency."  Wash 
ington  was  afraid  that  Henry  would  go  to  the  Senate 
and  "  make  shipwreck "  of  all  that  had  been  done. 
"  To  be  shipwrecked  in  sight  of  port,"  he  wrote  to 
Madison,  "  would  be  the  severest  of  all  possible  aggra 
vations  to  our  misery,  and  I  assure  you  I  am  under 
painful  apprehensions  from  the  single  circumstance  of 
Mr.  Henry  having  the  whole  game  to  play  in  the 
Assembly  of  this  State."  Later  Washington  wrote  to 
the  same  correspondent :  '  The  accounts  from  Rich 
mond  are  indeed  very  unpropitious  to  Federal  measures. 
In  one  word,  it  is  said  that  the  edicts  of  Mr.  H.  are 
enregistered  with  less  opposition  in  the  Virginia  Assem 
bly  than  those  of  the  grand  monarch  by  his  parliaments. 
He  has  only  to  say,  let  this  be  law,  and  it  is  law." 

358 


CHIEF  CRITIC  OF  THE  CONSTITUTION 

What  happened  in  the  Assembly  which  met  on  the 
2oth  of  October  may  be  briefly  told.  Henry  drew  up 
and  carried  through  several  papers  relating  to  the 
amendments,  which,  he  said,  were  essential,  since  they 
conserved  the  "  rights,  liberties,  and  privileges  of  free 
men."  The  counter-resolutions  of  the  Federalists 
admitted  the  necessity  of  amendments,  but  favored  their 
adoption  in  another  way.  Congress,  it  was  urged,  could 
submit  them  to  the  State  Legislatures.  By  strategy, 
then,  Henry  was  getting  a  part,  at  least,  of  what  he 
wanted.  It  was  clear  to  him  that  Madison  dreaded 
another  convention — sooner  than  see  another,  the  Fed 
eralists  would  accept  the  unwelcome  appendix  to  their 
book,  lest  the  book  itself  should  be  inked  out  and  lost 
in  quarrelsome  revision. 

Henry  refused  to  go  to  the  new  United  States  Senate. 
He  nominated  Richard  Henry  Lee  and  William  Gray- 
son,  who  were  elected,  and  incidentally  he  delivered 
a  "  tremendous  philippic  "  against  Madison,  one  of  the 
Federalist  candidates  for  the  office.  That  he  also  en 
deavored  to  keep  Madison  out  of  the  new  United  States 
House  of  Representatives  may  be  accepted  as  a  fact; 
but  it  is  doubtful  whether  Henry  is  entitled  to  the 
dubious  distinction  of  being  the  first  manipulator  of 
Congressional  districts.  Gerrymandering,  says  Sydney 
Howard  Gay,  "was  really  the  invention  of  Patrick 
Henry  " ;  and  in  Moses  Coit  Tyler's  book  we  find  the 
following :  "  Surely,  it  was  a  rare  bit  of  luck,  in  the 
case  of  Patrick  Henry,  that  the  wits  of  Virginia  did  not 
anticipate  the  wits  of  Massachusetts  by  describing  this 
trick  as  *  henrymandering,'  and  that  he  thus  narrowly 
escaped  the  ugly  immortality  of  having  his  name  handed 
down  from  age  to  age  in  the  coinage  of  a  base  word 
which  should  designate  a  base  thing — one  of  the  favor 
ite  shabby  manoeuvres  of  less  scrupulous  American 
politicians."  The  fact  is  that  both  sides  sought  advan- 

359 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

tage  in  arranging  the  Orange  district.  "  We  tried  to 
get  Fauquier,"  wrote  Colonel  Edward  Carrington,  Mad 
ison's  friend,  "  but  the  power  of  the  '  Antis '  was  too 
strong  for  us."  Nor  was  Henry  a  member  of  the  Com 
mittee  which  actually  districted  the  State.  Only  by 
implication,  therefore — as  a  leader  whose  will  was  cus 
tomarily  "  enregistered  "  by  the  House  of  Delegates — 
is  he  to  be  associated  with  this  early  instance  of  "  gerry 
mandering."  It  was  Monroe,  by  the  by,  who  contested 
the  Orange  district  with  Madison.  Fighting  each  other 
on  the  stump  that  fall,  the  future  Presidents  journeyed 
from  court-house  to  court-house,  and  though  Madison 
came  off  with  victory,  he  also  brought  down  from  "  the 
bleak  hills  of  Culpeper  "  a  pair  of  frost-bitten  ears. 

During  the  autumn  debates  in  the  House,  there  was 
one  delegate,  at  least,  who  had  no  notion  of  subscribing 
to  Henry's  opinions.  This  was  Francis  Corbin,  son  of 
the  Receiver-General  from  whom  Henry  had  exacted 
pay  for  the  raped  gunpowder.  At  the  outbreak  of  the 
Revolution  young  Corbin  had  gone  to  England,  where, 
as  a  college  student  and  a  courtier,  he  had  gathered 
polish ;  but  now  he  was  of  the  mind  to  favor  the  Vir 
ginians  with  his  services.  So  one  day  he  undertook  to 
confute  and  chastise  Henry,  selecting  ridicule  as  his 
whip  and  stepping  jauntily  forth  to  the  public  lashing. 
Henry  had  been  urging  the  necessity  of  the  proposed 
amendments,  and  had  concluded  with  the  assurance 
that  "  he  was  ready  and  willing,  at  all  times  and  on  all 
occasions,  to  bow  with  the  utmost  deference  to  the 
majesty  of  the  people."  This  phrase  gave  Corbin  his 
cue.  He  recounted  many  of  Henry's  acts,  and  at  the 
end  of  each  sarcastic  recital  exclaimed :  "  Yet  the 
gentleman  tells  us  that  '  he  bows  to  the  majesty  of 
the  people  ' !  "  Whereupon  the  young  man  himself 
bowed,  "  in  the  most  elegant  manner."  Let  Wirt  finish 
the  tale: 

360 


CHIEF  CRITIC  OF  THE  CONSTITUTION 

"  Thus  he  [Corbin]  proceeded,  through  a  number  of  animated 
sentences,  winding  up  each  with  the  same  words,  sarcastically 
repeated,  and  the  accompaniment  of  the  same  graceful  obeisance. 
Among  other  things,  he  said  '  it  was  of  little  importance 
whether  a  country  was  ruled  by  a  despot  with  a  tiara  on  his 
head,  or  by  a  demagogue  in  a  red  cloak,  a  caul-bare  wig/  etc. 
(describing  Mr.  Henry's  dress  so  minutely  as  to  draw  every 
eye  upon  him),  'although  he  should  profess  on  all  occasions 
to  bow  to  the  majesty  of  the  people.'  A  gentleman  who  was 
present  and  who,  struck  with  the  singularity  of  the  attack, 
had  the  curiosity  to  number  the  vibrations  of  those  words, 
and  the  accompanying  action,  states  that  he  counted  thirteen 
of  the  most  graceful  bows  he  ever  beheld.  The  friends  of 
Mr.  Henry  considered  such  an  attack  on  a  man  of  his  years 
and  high  character  as  very  little  short  of  sacrilege ;  on  the 
other  side  of  the  House,  there  was,  indeed,  a  smothered  sort 
of  dubious  laugh,  in  which  there  seemed  to  be  at  least  as 
much  apprehension  as  enjoyment.  Mr.  Henry  had  heard  the 
whole  of  it  without  any  apparent  mark  of  attention.  The 
young  gentleman,  having  finished  his  philippic,  very  much  at 
least  to  his  own  satisfaction,  took  his  seat  with  the  gayest 
expression  of  triumph  in  his  countenance. 

' '' Heu!    Nescia  mens  hominum  fati  sortisque  future?!' 

"  Mr.  Henry  raised  himself  up  heavily,  and  with  affected 
awkwardness — '  Mr.  Speaker,'  said  he,  '  I  am  a  plain  man,  and 
have  been  educated  altogether  in  Virginia.  My  whole  life 
has  been  spent  among  planters,  and  other  plain  men  of  similar 
education,  who  have  never  had  the  advantage  of  that  polish 
which  a  court  alone  can  give,  and  which  the  gentleman  over 
the  way  has  so  happily  acquired ;  indeed,  sir,  the  gentleman's 
employments  and  mine  (in  common  with  the  great  mass  of 
his  countrymen)  have  been  as  widely  different  as  our  fortunes; 
for  while  that  gentleman  was  availing  himself  of  the  oppor 
tunity,  which  a  splendid  fortune  afforded  him,  of  acquiring 
a  foreign  education,  mixing  among  the  great,  attending  levees 
and  courts,  basking  in  the  beams  of  royal  favor  at  St.  James', 
and  exchanging  courtesies  with  crowned  heads  '  (here  he  imi 
tated  Mr.  Corbin's  bows  at  court,  making  one  elegant,  but 
most  obsequious  and  sycophantic  bow),  'I  was  engaged  in  the 
arduous  toils  of  the  Revolution,  and  was  probably  as  far  from 
thinking  of  acquiring  those  polite  accomplishments  which  the 
gentleman  has  so  successfully  cultivated,  as  that  gentleman 
was  from  sharing  in  the  toils  and  dangers  in  which  his 
unpolished  countrymen  were  engaged.  I  will  not  therefore 

361 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

presume  to  vie  with  the  gentleman  in  those  courtly  accomplish 
ments  of  which  he  has  just  given  the  House  so  agreeable  a 
specimen;  yet  such  a  bow  as  I  can  make  shall  ever  be  at 
the  service  of  the  people.'  Herewith,  although  there  was  no 
man  who  could  make  a  more  graceful  bow  than  Mr.  Henry, 
he  made  one  so  ludicrously  awkward  and  clownish  as  took  the 
House  by  surprise  and  put  them  in  a  roar  of  laughter.  '  The 
gentleman,  I  hope,  will  commiserate  the  disadvantages  of 
education  under  which  I  have  labored,  and  will  be  pleased  to 
remember  that  I  have  never  been  a  favorite  with  that  mon 
arch  whose  gracious  smile  he  has  had  the  happiness  to  enjoy/ 
He  pursued  this  contrast  of  situations  and  engagements  for 
fifteen  or  twenty  minutes,  without  a  smile,  and  without  the 
smallest  token  of  resentment,  either  in  countenance,  expression, 
or  manner.  '  You  would  almost  have  sworn,'  says  a  corre 
spondent,  '  that  he  thought  himself  making  his  apology  for  his 
own  awkwardness,  before  a  full  drawing-room  at  St.  James'.' 
I  believe  there  was  not  a  person  that  heard  him,  the  sufferer 
himself  excepted,  who  did  not  feel  every  risible  nerve  affected. 
His  adversary  meantime  hung  down  his  head,  and  sinking 
lower  and  lower,  until  he  was  almost  concealed  behind  the 
interposing  forms,  submitted  to  the  discipline  as  quietly  as  a 
Russian  malefactor  who  had  been  beaten  with  the  knout 
till  all  sense  of  feeling  was  lost." 

Henry's  sway  at  Richmond  remained  unbroken  by 
Federalist  attacks,  and  Mount  Vernon  was  disturbed. 
Tobias  Lear  wrote  thence :  "  And  after  he  had  settled 
everything  relative  to  the  government  wholly,  I  sup 
pose,  to  his  satisfaction,  he  mounted  his  horse  and  rode 
home,  leaving  the  little  business  of  the  State  to  be  done 
by  anybody  who  chose  to  give  themselves  the  trouble 
of  attending  it."  Bancroft  uses  almost  the  same  words 
in  telling  of  Henry's  departure  for  Prince  Edward  in 
November,  1788.  But  Henry  had  a  peculiar  reason  for 
leaving  Richmond.  His  sister  Anne  had  come  home 
from  Kentucky  to  die.  It  was  the  wish  to  see  this  dear 
one  and  be  with  her  that  led  him  to  turn  his  back  upon 
Federalists  and  Anti-Federalists  alike.  He  was  sorry 
to  lose  Washington's  friendship;  but  it  seemed  to  him 

362 


CHIEF  CRITIC  OF  THE  CONSTITUTION 

to  be  necessary  to  oppose  that  great  man,  and  he  did 
so  without  undue  compunction.  Nor  was  he  in  the 
least  distressed  by  the  attacks  of  the  Independent 
Chronicle,  of  Richmond.  These  began  in  December  and 
continued  until  March.  They  were  signed  "  Decius," 
supposed  by  some  to  be  James  Montgomery,  but  more 
probably  John  Nicholas.  They  were  most  malefic  and 
abominable,  but  Henry  minded  them  not.  His  friends 
throughout  the  State  were  outraged,  and  some  of  them 
rushed  into  print.  In  Hanover  a  "  Decius  "  defender 
was  "  flogged  "  for  his  pains.  In  the  end,  as  Edmund 
Randolph  noted  in  a  letter  to  Madison,  the  attacks  did 
the  Federalists  more  harm  than  good. 

Madison's  election  to  Congress  was  only  brought 
about  by  a  promise  made  by  him  that  he  would  coun 
tenance  the  amendments  to  the  Constitution.  Accord 
ingly,  when  Congress  met,  he  introduced  in  the  House 
not  twenty  but  seventeen  amendments.  The  Senate 
cut  the  seventeen  down  to  twelve ;  and  finally,  on  De 
cember  15,  1791,  ten  of  these  amendments  became 
a  part  of  the  Constitution.  On  the  theory  that  half  a 
loaf  is  better  than  none,  Henry  was  obliged  to  be  con 
tent.  But  he  was  despondent.  Hamilton's  Assumption 
Act  troubled  him  greatly,  because  it  foretokened  the 
loss  of  powers  to  the  States  and  the  gain  of  central 
strength.  Moreover,  the  Assembly  of  1789  was  less 
to  his  liking  than  previous  Legislatures  had  been.  Upon 
Grayson's  death,  in  1790,  Henry  shook  his  head  when 
asked  to  stand  for  the  Senate,  and  at  the  end  of  that 
year  he  retired  from  public  life. 

William  Wirt  Henry  is  justified  in  regarding  the 
Virginia  debates  as  of  prime  value  in  supplementing 
the  work  of  the  Constitutional  Convention.  At  the 
moment  of  the  adoption  of  the  new  government,  he 
says,  "  two  conflicting  theories  as  to  its  nature  "  were 
advanced. 

363 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

"  They  continued  to  divide  parties  afterward  more  distinctly. 
The  party  organized  by  Jefferson,  and  afterward  led  by 
Calhoun,  insisted  that  the  States  had  entered  into  a  compact, 
that  they  were  still  sovereign,  and  had  only  delegated  powers 
which  could  be  recalled.  The  party  organized  by  Hamilton, 
and  afterward  led  by  Webster,  agreed  with  Mr.  Henry,  that 
the  people  of  the  States  had  created  a  national  government, 
and  endowed  it  with  certain  supreme  powers  which  were 
irrevocable  by  the  several  States,  except  by  amendment,  as 
provided  in  the  instrument  itself,  or  by  revolution.  This  con 
struction  was  adopted  by  the  Supreme  Court,  and  acted  on 
by  the  Federal  Government  in  its  several  departments,  and 
has  been  finally  established  beyond  controversy  by  the  result 
of  the  greatest  civil  war  history  has  recorded,  brought  about 
by  the  endeavor  of  the  Southern  States  to  exercise  the  asserted 
right  of  secession." 


364 


XVI 

AS    A    LAWYER — ANECDOTES 

WE  have  seen  why  and  how  Patrick  Henry  became 
a  lawyer;  we  have  looked  into  the  fee-books  kept  by 
him  prior  to  the  Revolution,  which  interrupted  his 
practice;  and  we  have  heard  one  of  his  friends  say 
to  him :  "  Go  back  to  the  bar — your  tongue  will  soon 
pay  your  debts."  But  as  yet  we  have  not  stepped  into 
his  old  stick-gig  and  journeyed  with  him  along  the  Vir 
ginia  roads  towards  some  distant  court-house.  This 
gig,  or  "  chair,"  and  the  little  hair-trunk  Henry  strapped 
on  behind  the  seat  are  now  the  prized  possessions  of 
Louis  D.  Jones  at  New  Store,  in  Buckingham.  Fresh 
linen,  papers  pertinent  to  suits  that  were  to  be  argued, 
and  a  book  or  so  were  packed  in  the  trunk.  There  is 
evidence  that  Henry  appreciated  books  more  thoroughly 
as  he  grew  older.  In  one  sense,  he  must  have  had  less 
need  of  them — in  executing  the  laws  he  must  have 
learned  a  great  deal  of  law;  in  drafting  bills  he  must 
have  perfected  himself  along  certain  lines;  in  buying 
land  he  must  have  acquired  useful  information — in  a 
word,  the  experiences  of  his  later  life  had  added  to  his 
legal  store;  yet  we  find  him  peering  between  book- 
covers  as  he  followed  the  roads  in  his  gig.  Some  of  his 
law-books  were  tossed  up  by  the  Civil  War  into  the 
auction-mart  at  Richmond,  and  sold  and  scattered.  Per 
haps  a  favorite  volume  was  Dunmore's  black-letter  Coke, 
which  Henry  had  bought  in  Williamsburg.  Campbell, 
who  saw  the  book,  says :  "  It  has  his  lordship's  arms 
and  the  orator's  autograph."  Judge  Winston  tells  us 
that  Henry  travelled  about  "on  a  circuit  (Nelson  and 
White,  Judges)  carrying  Soame  Jenyns,  of  which  he 

365 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

gave  the  Judges  a  copy,  desiring  them  at  the  same  time 
not  to  take  him  for  a  travelling  monk."  This  book, 
which  bears  the  title,  "  Internal  Evidences  of  Christian 
ity,"  was  printed  and  given  free  circulation  in  Virginia 
at  Henry's  own  expense.  Howe  says  that  Henry  did 
the  same  with  Butler's  "  Analogy,"  adding :  "  Sherlock's 
Sermons,  he  affirmed,  was  the  work  which  removed  all 
his  doubts  of  the  truth  of  Christianity ;  a  copy  of  which, 
until  a  short  time  since,  was  filled  with  marginal  notes. 
He  read  it  every  Sunday  evening  to  his  family,  after 
which  they  all  joined  in  sacred  music,  while  he  accom 
panied  them  on  the  violin.  He  never  quoted  poetry. 
His  quotations  were  from  the  Bible,  and  his  illustrations 
from  the  Bible  and  ancient  and  modern  history."  * 

But  we  have  taken  him  away  from  his  family  and 
started  him  in  his  gig  towards  the  court-houses ;  and  we 
shall  go  on  in  that  direction  after  inviting  attention  to 
an  important  fact:  Henry  was  almost  a  born  believer, 
as  well  as  a  born  Whig.  He  got  his  religion  and  his 
politics  out  of  nature  in  the  first  place,  and  in  the  next 
place  out  of  that  part  of  the  Bible  which  teaches  kind 
ness  to  all  men.  Milton,  Locke,  Sidney,  and  other 
great  forebears  of  freedom  had  intellectualized  the  grand 
political  idea;  but  it  came  to  Henry,  as  it  did  to  other 
men  of  his  day,  by  the  working  of  his  own  mind.  Now, 

*  In  William  Meade's  "  Old  Churches,  Ministers,  and 
Families  of  Virginia,"  vol.  ii,  p.  12,  the  Rev.  Mr.  Dresser  says 
that  Patrick  Henry  had  "  a  very  great  abhorrence  of  infidelity, 
and  actually  wrote  a  reply  to  '  Paine's  Age  of  Reason/  but 
destroyed  it  before  his  death."  "  This,"  comments  Edward 
Fontaine,  "  is  certainly  true.  My  father,  Colonel  Patrick  H. 
Fontaine,  was  the  oldest  grandson  of  Patrick  Henry.  He  was 
living  with  his  grandfather  when  he  wrote  the  reply  to  Paine 
mentioned  by  Mr.  Dresser."  But  Patrick  Henry,  having  read 
Bishop  Watson's  "  Apology  for  the  Bible,"  and  deeming  it  a 
sufficient  answer  to  Paine,  decided  not  to  publish  his  own 
manuscript. 

366 


AS  A  LAWYER 

while  he  was  on  the  circuit,  it  became  fashionable  in 
Virginia  for  young  men  to  pin  atheistic  ruffles  to  their 
shirts.  French  views  were  popular,  and  threatened  to 
prevail.  Henry  was  hurt  by  the  talk  of  the  young  men. 
Here  from  the  Wirt  papers  is  a  scrap  of  manuscript, 
much  crumpled,  torn,  and  stained,  and  it  reads : 

"  When  the  first  Constitution  of  France  (in  1789)  was  formed, 
it  afforded  great  and  general  satisfaction,  and  became  the  sub 
ject  of  conversation  in  a  circle  of  which  Mr.  P.  Henry  was  one. 
He  was  asked  what  he  thought  of  it,  and  whether  the  powers 
of  Europe  would  consent  to  its  undisturbed  operation.  He 
immediately  replied :  '  No,  no,  no ! — the  Kings  and  Powers  of 
Europe  will  not  rest  until  they  have  deluged  that  country  in 
blood/  " 

He  sympathized  with  the  multitudes  of  fellow-beings 
who  were  under  the  yoke  in  France,  but  he  had  no 
patience  with  the  extravagances  and  bloody  horrors  of 
French  democracy,  and  would  not  put  up  with  French 
infidelity.  In  course  of  time  his  antipathy  to  the  im 
ported  doctrines  would  cause  him  to  oppose  them  politi 
cally,  but  just  now  he  was  endeavoring  as  best  he  could 
to  counteract  the  irreligious  tendency  of  the  hour.  That 
is  why  he  praised  Soame  Jenyns  to  the  judges  and 
doubtless  to  others  whom  he  met  on  the  road  or  on  the 
court-house  greens. 

We  of  this  day  would  like  to  come  upon  a  good 
report  of  some  roadside  talk  with  Henry  about  the  dif 
ference  between  the  American  and  French  Revolutions. 
We  can  imagine  the  scene — a  summer  sky,  with  woolly 
clouds  lazily  drifting;  shade  at  a  cool  ford,  the  horses 
splashing;  an  interested  questioner  in  one  gig,  and 
Henry  answering  from  the  other.  We  should  like  to 
hear  Henry  on  this  subject,  because  we  are  sure  he 
would  show  with  precision  wherein  his  democracy  and 
Mason's  differed  from  the  newfangled  French  democ 
racy  about  to  be  engrafted  by  Jefferson  upon  the  Ameri- 

367 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

can  stock.  But  possibly,  at  such  a  meeting,  each  way 
farer  would  have  produced  a  Federal  receipt  for  his  gig- 
tax;  the  talk,  indeed,  might  have  been  upon  that — the 
first  United  States  internal  tax;  a  strange  thing  for 
Stamp  Act  survivors  to  contemplate,  and  a  matter  pro 
vocative  of  "  remarks  "  at  the  expense  of  a  consolidated 
government  which  might  end  in  heaven  knew  what. 

Several  taverns  south  of  the  James  preserve  traditions 
of  Henry  as  a  guest,  but  the  "  Lawyers,"  eight  miles 
from  New  London  Court-house,  is  more  richly  rem 
iniscent  of  him  than  any  other.  Not  far  away  is  Jef 
ferson's  "  Poplar  Forest,"  an  octagonal  brick  Monticello 
in  miniature,  designed  by  Jefferson  himself,  and  shaded 
by  trees  that  were  huge  of  girth  long  before  he  or  any 
other  white  man  looked  upon  the  Blue  Ridge.  Another 
great  Democrat  comes  into  the  story  at  this  point — 
General  Andrew  Jackson,  who  saw  Henry  once,  probably 
at  New  London.  In  Parton's  "  Life  of  Jackson/' 
Colonel  Avery  is  quoted  thus: 

"  I  was  present  one  evening  in  Jonesboro  when  General 
Jackson  was  talking  to  some  dozen  of  his  friends.  He  told 
them  that  in  passing  through  a  town  in  Virginia  he  learned  at 
breakfast  that  Patrick  Henry  was  to  defend  a  criminal  that  day. 
He  was  induced  to  stop.  '  No  description  I  had  -ever  heard,' 
said  Jackson,  warmly,  '  no  conception  I  had  ever  formed,  had 
given  me  any  just  ideas  of  the  man's  powers  of  eloquence.'  " 

Judge  Roane  says :  "  It  was  as  a  criminal  lawyer  that 
his  eloquence  had  the  fairest  scope."  William  Wirt 
Henry  adds :  "  His  wonderful  powers  as  an  advocate 
made  him  especially  great  in  nisi  prius  practice,  but  he 
was  also  retained  in  important  chancery  causes,  and 
some  of  his  greatest  triumphs  were  in  arguments 
addressed  to  judges  on  questions  of  law.  Having  dis 
continued  his  profession  for  over  thirteen  years,  it  was 
wonderful  how  rapidly  he  was  able  to  recall  it,  and  enter 

368 


AS  A  LAWYER 

at  once  upon  one  of  the  most  brilliant  careers  as  an 
advocate  ever  known  to  the  profession." 

His  fame,  his  popularity,  his  extraordinary  persua 
siveness,  caused  clients  to  come  to  him,  not  only  from 
Prince  Edward  and  the  adjoining  counties,  but  from 
remote  regions.  Hence  he  could  dictate  large  fees,  and 
require  his  clients  to  employ  other  lawyers  to  get  every 
thing  ready  in  the  preliminaries.  A  letter  of  his  to  Rob 
ert  Carter,  of  Nomini,  shows  just  how  he  managed  the 
matter  of  fees.  From  this  Carter  another  Carter, 
Colonel  Charles,  wished  to  recover  twelve  thousand 
acres  of  land.  The  trial  was  at  far-away  Leesburg, 
near  Potomac  water,  and  Henry  must  have  been  many 
days  in  his  gig  when  he  journeyed  thither.  Edmund 
Randolph,  who  was  the  opposing  counsel,  writes  to  a 
friend,  under  date  of  Fredericksburg,  August  18,  1789: 

"  The  day  before  yesterday  I  returned  thither  from  Lees- 
burg,  where  I  was  confronted  with  Mr.  Henry,  and  for  three 
days  we  lay  alongside  of  each  other.  It  was  a  diverting  scene, 
taken  in  the  whole.  My  client,  Charles  Carter,  must  have 
been  defeated  if  a  single  point  of  four  had  gone  against  him ; 
and  to  obtain  one  everything  was  attempted  in  the  way  of 
assertion,  declamation,  and  solecism.  In  three  points  the  Court 
was  unanimous  against  Mr.  H. ;  on  the  fourth  he  had  a  bare 
majority.  Thus  being  mortified  with  defeats,  and  willing  to 
disguise  them  under  the  name  of  a  compromise,  he  proposed 
that  his  client,  Robert  Carter,  should  surrender  6000  acres  of 
land  a*nd  i  450.  To  this  I  agreed,  knowing  that  two  of  the  four 
points  were  in  strictness'  by  no  means  in  our  favor." 

But  Henry's  letter  puts  the  matter  in  a  different  light. 
So  far  from  being  chagrined,  he  was  felicitating  himself 
upon  having  brought  his  client  out  of  a  slippery  situa 
tion.  He  reminds  Carter  that  in  case  of  failure  the 
fee  was  to  be  one  hundred  guineas ;  in  case  of  complete 
success,  four  hundred  guineas  ;  and  he  takes  him  sharply 
to  task  for  the  non-payment  of  the  two  hundred  guineas 
demanded. 

24  369 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

Henry  was  accused  of  exacting  large  fees;  hence 
there  is  a  tradition,  now  wide-spread  in  Virginia,  that  he 
was  too  eager  for  money.  This  tradition  has  bred  an 
other — to  the  effect  that  he  was  frugal  in  small  things. 
It  is  even  said  that  he  wore  a  cap  indoors  to  save  his 
wig.  William  Sullivan,  in  his  "  Familiar  Letters  on 
Public  Characters  and  Public  Events,"  says :  "  Gentle 
men  wore  wigs  when  abroad,  and  commonly  caps  when 
at  home."  Writing  of  John  Hancock,  he  adds : 

"At  this  time  (June,  1782),  about  noon,  Hancock  was 
dressed  in  a  red  velvet  cap,  within  which  was  one  of  fine 
linen.  The  latter  was  turned  up  over  the  lower  edge  of  the 
velvet  one  two  or  three  inches.  He  wore  a  blue  damask  gown 
lined  with  silk,  a  white  stock,  a  white  satin  embroidered 
waistcoat,  black  satin  small-clothes,  white  silk  stockings,  and 
red  morocco  slippers." 

In  the  light  of  this  testimony  as  to  caps  and  the  like, 
it  is  clear  that  the  notably  hospitable  Henry,  who  was 
liberal  enough  to  print  books  at  his  own  expense  that 
he  might  give  them  away,  has  been  abused  by  tradition. 
Yet  tradition  is  well  supported  when  it  declares  that 
Henry  worked  hard  to  acquire  a  fortune.  He  felt  him 
self  weakening  in  health,  and  he  knew  that  if  old  age 
should  catch  him  poor  the  world  would  let  him  remain 
so.  The  world  is  a  grateful  world  sentimentally,  but 
ungrateful  when  it  comes  to  the  matter  of  bread,  meat, 
and  a  proper  allowance  of  self-respect.  He  had  given 
the  best  of  himself  to  the  public.  That  was  very  well 
in  its  way ;  but  prosaic  times  had  now  come  on,  so  he 
must  consider  his  private  responsibilities — must  provide 
for  his  patriarchal  family,  and  must  exercise  the  same 
care  in  his  work  for  himself  as  he  had  shown  in  his 
work  for  the  people.  Hence  he  became  a  busy  man, 
a  money-maker;  and  the  more  money  he  made,  the 
greater  was  his  thrift. 

370 


AS  A  LAWYER 

Further  analysis  of  this  part  of  Henry's  character 
indicates  that  he.  was  influenced  by  the  recollection  of 
his  father's  shortcomings  in  practical  matters.  John 
Henry  was  bookish,  and,  like  many  bookish  men  in  all 
generations,  he  was  weak  as  a  money-maker.  In  con 
sequence,  he  was  frequently  in  trouble.  Patrick  Henry 
may  have  made  up  his  mind  not  to  be  as  his  father  had 
been — a  victim  of  impracticality — but  to  acquire  a  com 
petence.  This  explains  why,  in  some  particulars,  he 
may  have  been  a  "  close  man,"  as  he  certainly  was  a 
"  business  man/'  with  the  accretive  sense  duly  developed. 
His  fees  were  larger  in  proportion  than  the  fees  of 
contemporary  lawyers.  There  are  many  lawyers  now 
who  would  think  Henry's  fees  small,  but  they  were  large 
for  that  day. 

As  in  Henry's  case,  Washington's  business  ability  was 
pronounced.  His  training  as  a  surveyor  made  him 
appreciate  the  value  of  land,  and  he  was  shrewd  to 
profit  by  what  he  knew  in  this  respect.  He,  too,  had  the 
accretive  sense.  He  was  in  every  way  a  solid,  substan 
tial  man,  who  expressed  himself  clearly  because  he 
thought  clearly.  His  uniform  hand  in  writing  shows 
how  equable  he  was.  Henry's  drive-ahead  hand  is  also 
in  character.  The  spaces  between  his  words  are  thin, 
and  the  words  themselves  convey  the  exact  meaning 
intended. 

About  the  time  Henry  turned  to  the  pursuit  of  riches, 
he  wrote  to  Richard  Henry  Lee :  "  Your  age  and  mine 
seems  to  exempt  us  from  the  task  of  stepping  forth  again 
into  the  busy  scenes  which  now  present  themselves." 
Both  must  have  felt  that  they  had  seen  enough  of  public 
life.  It  is  the  nature  of  men  to  be  fired  with  zeal,  and 
then,  when  their  ends  have  been  attained,  to  lose  their 
zest  for  the  very  work  once  so  absorbing  to  them. 
Henry,  for  his  part,  had  supped  to  surfeit  on  public 
honors.  He  had  been  too  popular  for  his  own  peace, 

371 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

and  the  revulsion  from  his  own  glories  was  a  natural 
thing.  Mason,  an  admirable  character,  likewise  turned 
back  to  his  farm.  He  possessed  a  healthy  nature — 
was  interested  in  the  affairs  of  his  own  little  world. 
His  sense  of  duty  to  the  numerous  people  around  him 
was  strong.  There  was  no  lack  of  public  spirit  in  these 
men  at  any  time,  as  long  as  they  lived ;  but  they  had  a 
proper  sense  of  their  obligations  to  their  own  house 
holds. 

When  it  is  said  that  Henry  grew  rich  before  he  with 
drew  from  the  bar,  we  must  understand  that  he  was  only 
relatively  rich — independent.  A  fortune  that  would  now 
seem  small  appeared  large  in  those  days.  He  was  proud 
of  his  success  as  a  money-maker — prouder  of  that  than 
of  his  successes  in  statesmanship.  Here  we  detect  a 
vagary,  a  flaw  in  his  character,  and  conclude  that  we  love 
the  young  and  fiery  and  resolute  and  glorious  Henry 
better  than  we  do  the  old  Henry,  tying  the  strings  of 
his  guinea-bag.  But  we  are  also  to  remember  the  chill 
that  comes  over  the  spirit  of  old  men  when  they  think 
of  their  near  approach  to  dissolution,  and  we  are  to 
bear  in  mind  that  in  age  the  heart  of  a  man  like  Henry 
is  consumingly  tender  towards  his  offspring. 

Most  of  the  anecdotes  about  Henry's  shrewdness  in 
extricating  clients  from  difficulties  relate  to  this  period  of 
his  practice.  No  doubt  some  of  these  stories,  as  told  in 
Virginia  to-day,  are  tinctured  by  the  medium  through 
which  they  have  passed  in  coming  down  to  us.  If  the 
tale  be  coarse,  as  it  often  is,  it  may  have  got  its  coarse 
ness  in  franker  times  than  ours,  or  it  may  have  been 
vulgarized  by  tavern  gossips,  who  put  into  it  a  coloring 
all  their  own.  Many  of  the  anecdotes  have  variants, 
according  to  the  locality  in  which  they  are  told.  But 
humor  usually  runs  through  them;  and  Henry  is  in 
variably  the  hero. 

There  are  several  thieving  knaves  in  the  Henry  anec- 
373 


AS  A  LAWYER 

dotes.  He  missed  so  much  corn  from  one  of  his  corn- 
cribs  that  he  decided  to  bring  the  culprit  to  book.  Ac 
cordingly,  a  steel-trap  was  set  inside  the  crib,  near  an 
opening  through  which  the  thief  drew  out  the  corn. 
Henry  himself  paid  an  early  morning  visit  to  the  crib ; 
and  lo !  alongside  it,  by  the  aperture,  was  a  neighbor 
of  good  substance  and  repute.  One  arm  was  invisible, 
and  the  entrapped  rogue  stood  as  if  leaning  against  the 
crib.  "  Good  morning,  sir,"  said  Henry,  with  politeness 
and  friendly  warmth.  He  asked  after  the  man's  family ; 
spoke  volubly  of  the  weather,  the  crops,  politics ;  and, 
turning  finally,  cried  out  in  the  heartiest  manner,  "  Come 
in  to  breakfast — come  on  in !  "  And  with  that  he  walked 
briskly  away.  One  may  imagine  the  grin  and  the  glib 
observations  of  the  black  boy  secretly  sent  by  Henry  to 
liberate  the  poacher. 

Since  Henry  undoubtedly  had  "  a  tendency  to  grace," 
it  is  hard  to  believe  the  traditional  shoat  story  heard  in 
the  Lynchburg  region,  where  he  is  still  spoken  of  as 
"  the  Governor."  It  is  told  in  about  this  style :  "  A 
man  stole  a  hog,  dressed  it,  and  went  to  the  Governor 
to  defend  him.  The  Governor  said :  '  Did  you  walk 
away  with  that  shoat?'  'I  don't  like  to  say.'  'Out 
with  it ! '  '  Yessir.'  '  Have  you  got  the  carcass  ?  ' 
'  Yessir.'  *  You  go  home,  you  wretch ;  cut  the  pig 
lengthwise  in  half,  and  hang  as  much  of  it  in  my  smoke 
house  as  you  keep  in  yours.'  At  court  the  Governor 
said :  '  Your  Honor,  this  man  has  no  more  of  that 
stolen  shoat  than  I  have.  If  necessary,  I'd  kiss  the 
Bible  on  this.'  The  man  was  cleared." 

As  Henry  keenly  enjoyed  practical  jokes  at  the  ex 
pense  of  his  friends  on  the  bench,  as  he  liked  to  do  sur 
prising  things  of  a  harmless  sort,  and  as  he  was  a 
privileged  character  in  some  degree,  it  is  possible  that 
the  various  petit  larceny  anecdotes  were  based  on  actual 
happenings.  One  Sunday  evening,  while  on  the  way  to 

373 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

a  court  in  which  he  was  to  appear  next  morning,  he  fell 
in  with  a  witness  in  a  horse-stealing  case.  They  talked 
it  over.  Said  Henry,  commenting  on  an  assertion: 
"  You  wouldn't  say  that  in  open  court  if  I'd  give  you 
every  guinea  I'm  jingling  here  in  my  hand."  Vowing 
that  he  would,  the  man  took  the  money.  When  he  stood 
up  to  testify  next  day,  Henry,  who  was  counsel  for 
the  defendant,  also  rose,  and  made  short  work  of  him 
and  of  the  case,  on  the  ground  that  a  witness  who  would 
permit  himself  to  be  influenced  by  money  was  incom 
petent.  If  this  tale  and  others  like  it  be  true — and  the 
specimens  here  given  have  no  basis  but  countryside  tra 
dition — the  standard  of  ethics  at  the  criminal  bar  was 
much  lower  in  those  days  than  at  present. 

But  here  is  a  more  pleasing  story,  illustrative  of 
Henry's  ingenuity.  It  is  a  part  of  the  folk-lore  of 
Virginia.  As  told  by  a  graybeard,  sitting  on  the  steps 
of  St.  John's  Church,  within  a  few  feet  of  the  spot  where 
Henry  stood  while  making  his  "  Liberty  or  Death " 
speech,  it  had  a  charm  and  an  effectiveness  impossible 
to  reconvey  on  this  poor  page,  since  no  birds  sing  for 
us  here  as  they  sang  in  the  beautiful  grove,  with  its 
graves  of  great  men,  its  trees,  and  its  flowers. 

"  Did  you  ever  know,"  said  the  graybeard,  resting 
his  hands  on  the  knob  of  his  hickory  stick,  "  how  Patrick 
Henry  untwisted  a  little  love-tangle?  I'll  tell  you.  A 
young  fellow  wanted  to  get  married  without  being  over 
taken  by  the  law.  The  girl,  ditto;  but  her  parents 
objected.  She  was  not  of  age,  and  the  law  had  it  all 
fixed  that  if  he  ran  away  with  her~and  was  caught,  he 
could  be  sent  to  jail.  That's  where  the  trouble  was. 
But  the  young  fellow  took  his  trouble  to  Patrick  Henry  ; 
and  Patrick  said :  '  You  really  love  her,  do  you  ?  How 
much  do  you  love  her?  Do  you  love  her  better  than 
gold?  How  much  would  you  give  out  of  pocket  if 
you  could  get  your  sweetheart  and  never  cast  a  shadow 

374 


AS  A  LAWYER 

in  the  doorway  of  a  jail  ?  '  '  I'd  give  a  hundred  guineas/ 
said  his  client.  '  Agreed !  Now  do  as  I  tell  you.  Go 
see  your  ladylove;  request  her  to  take  a  horse  out  of 
her  father's  stable,  mount,  make  off,  and  meet  you 
at  an  appointed  place.  You  are  to  be  on  foot.  You 
are  to  get  on  behind  her.  Ride  to  the  nearest  preacher's, 
and  get  married.  You  will  be  arrested ;  but  never  mind 
that,  for  I  shall  be  there  to  see  you  through.'  -Now  we 
come  to  the  second  chapter — with  everybody  in  court 
from  five  miles  'round.  The  Commonwealth's  attorney 
said  it  was  so  plain  a  case  that  he  would  simply  state 
the  law  and  the  facts,  and  be  done  with  it.  He  did  so; 
after  which  Patrick  got  up,  and  admitted  that  the  law 
was  just  as  the  prosecutor  had  urged.  But  he  would  be 
better  satisfied,  he  said,  if  the  young  woman  should  take 
the  stand  and  give  an  account  of  the  elopement.  So  up 
she  went,  the  pretty  bride,  and  all  the  men  shuffled  and 
craned,  and  the  judges  sat  straight.  Then  she  said, 
said  she :  *  I  told  my  lover  to  meet  me  at  a  certain  spot. 
I  got  out  a  good  horse  from  my  father's  stable,  and  rode 
to  where  he  was.  I  took  my  lover  up  behind  me,  and 
ran  away  with  him/  '  Did  he  run  away  with  you  ? ' 
said  the  sly  old  Pat.  '  No,  sir,  I  ran  away  with  him/ 
'  Oh ! '  said  Patrick,  '  I  see ! '  The  court  got  into  a  side 
splitting  shake;  the  crowd  roared;  the  Commonwealth 
attorney  came  down  the  persimmon-tree,  and  the  happy 
chap  marched  off  with  the  persimmon." 

Of  the  authenticated  stories,  one  of  the  best  has  the 
old  Court-house  at  New  London  as  the  scene.  Prior 
to  the  Revolution,  many  Scotch  merchants  lived  at  New 
London  ;  and  the  Chevalier  de  Chastellux  saw  in  it  a  thriv 
ing  border  town.  A  print  in  Howe's  "  Historical  Col 
lections  "  shows  the  Court-house  as  a  plain,  one-story 
frame  structure,  dismally  suggestive  of  tens  of  thou 
sands  of  American  dwellings  of  the  pioneering  period, 
when  a  roof  was  a  thing  that  kept  the  rain  away,  and  no 

375 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

more.  Here  was  tried  the  case  of  John  Hook,  who 
kept  a  store  at  New  London,  against  John  Venable,  a 
commissary  of  the  Continental  Army.  Hook  was  a 
Scotchman  and  a  Tory,  and  when  the  American  soldiers 
were  suffering  for  food  during  the  Cornwallis  invasion, 
Venable  had  seized  two  of  Hook's  steers.  Says  Wirt, 
on  the  authority  of  Judge  Archibald  Stuart : 

"  The  act  had  not  been  strictly  legal ;  and  on  the  establish 
ment  of  peace,  Hook,  under  the  advice  of  Mr.  Cowan,  a 
gentleman  of  some  distinction  in  the  law,  thought  proper  to 
bring  an  action  of  trespass  against  Mr.  Venable,  in  the  district 
court  of  New  London.  Mr.  Henry  appeared  for  the  defendant, 
and  is  said  to  have  disported  himself  in  this  cause  to  the 
infinite  enjoyment  of  his  hearers,  the  unfortunate  Hook  always 
excepted.  He  appeared  to  have  complete  control  over  the 
passions  of  his  audience:  at  one  time  he  excited  their  indig 
nation  against  Hook — vengeance  was  visible  in  every  counte 
nance  ;  again,  when  he  chose  to  relax,  and  ridicule  him,  the 
whole  audience  was  in  a  roar  of  laughter.  He  painted  the 
distresses  of  the  American  army,  exposed  almost  naked  to  the 
rigor  of  a  winter's  sky,  and  marking  the  frozen  ground  over 
which  they  marched  with  the  blood  of  their  unshod  feet. 
'  Where  was  the  man/  he  said,  '  who  had  an  American  heart  in 
his  bosom,  who  would  not  have  thrown  open  his  fields,  his 
barns,  his  cellars,  the  doors  of  his  house,  the  portals  of  his 
breast,  to  receive  with  open  arms  the  meanest  soldier  in  that 
little  band  of  famished  patriots?  Where  is  the  man?  There  he 
stands — but  whether  the  heart  of  an  American  beats  in  his 
bosom,  you,  gentlemen,  are  to  judge.'  He  then  carried  the 
jury,  by  the  powers  of  his  imagination,  to  the  plains  around 
York,  the  surrender  of  which  had  followed  shortly  after  the  act 
complained  of ;  he  depicted  the  surrender  in  the  most  noble 
and  glowing  colors  of  his  eloquence — the  audience  saw  before 
their  eyes  the  humiliation  and  dejection  of  the  British  as  they 
marched  out  of  their  trenches — they  saw  the  triumph  which 
lighted  up  every  patriot  face,  and  heard  the  shouts  of  victory, 
and  the  cry  of  Washington  and  liberty,  as  it  rung  and  echoed 
through  the  American  ranks,  and  was  reverberated  from  the 
hills  and  shores  of  the  neighboring  river — '  But  hark !  What 
notes  of  discord  are  these  which  disturb  the  general  joy  and 
silence  the  acclamations  of  victory?  They  are  the  notes  of 

376 


AS  A  LAWYER 

John   Hook,   hoarsely   bawling   through   the   American    camp, 
beef!  beef!  beef!' 

"  The  whole  audience  was  convulsed.  A  particular  incident 
will  give  a  better  idea  of  the  effect  than  any  general  description. 
The  clerk  of  the  court,  unable  to  command  himself,  and  un 
willing  to  commit  any  breach  of  decorum  in  his  place,  rushed 
out  of  the  court-house  and  threw  himself  on  the  grass,  in  the 
most  violent  paroxysm  of  laughter,  where  he  was  rolling  when 
Hook,  with  very  different  feelings,  came  out  for  relief  into 
the  yard  also.  '  Jemmy  Steptoe/  said  he  to  the  clerk,  '  what 
the  devil  ails  ye,  mon  ?  '  Mr.  Steptoe  was  only  able  to  say 
that  he  could  not  help  it.  '  Never  mind  ye,'  said  Hook, 
'  wait  till  Billy  Cowan  gets  up :  he  '11  show  him  the  la'.'  Mr. 
Cowan,  however,  was  so  completely  overwhelmed  by  the 
torrent  which  bore  upon  his  client,  that  when  he  rose  to  reply 
to  Mr.  Henry,  he  was  scarcely  able  to  make  an  intelligible  or 
audible  remark.  The  cause  was  decided  almost  by  acclamation. 
The  jury  retired,  for  form's  sake,  and  instantly  returned  with 
a  verdict  for  the  defendant.  Nor  did  the  effect  of  Mr. 
Henry's  speech  stop  here.  The  people  were  so  highly  excited 
by  the  Tory  audacity  of  such  a  suit,  that  Hook  began  to  hear 
around  him  a  cry  more  terrible  than  that  of  beef :  it  was  the 
cry  of  tar  and  feathers;  from  the  application  of  which  it  is 
said  that  nothing  saved  him  but  a  precipitate  flight  and  the 
speed  of  his  horse." 

For  accuracy's  sake,  we  may  add  that  the  jury  in  this 
"  Johnny  "  Hook  case  did  not  return  a  "  verdict  for  the 
defendant."  It  became  the  duty  of  the  same  "  Jemmy  " 
Steptoe  who  rolled  off  his  surplusage  of  hilarity  on  the 
Court-house  green  to  write  in  the  records :  "  The  verdict 
was  for  one  penny  damages,  and  one  penny  costs  to  be 
paid  by  the  plaintiff."  * 

In  1813  there  appeared  in  the  Republican  Farmer,  of 
Staunton,  a  series  of  papers  under  the  title  "  The  Moun- 

*  There  are  descendants  of  John  Hook  in  Franklin  County, 
Virginia,  who  do  not  relish  the  accepted  account  of  this 
humorous  scene.  As  recently  as  September  i,  1875,  there  ap 
peared  in  the  Richmond  Dispatch  a  long  defence  of  Hook,  who 
acquired  a  great  deal  of  land,  owned  a  hundred  slaves,  and 
"  died  rich  and  respected." 

377 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

taineer."     They  were  written  by  the  Rev.  Dr.  Conrad 
Speece,  of  the  Augusta  Church.     One  of  them  follows : 

"  Many  years  ago,  I  was  at  the  trial,  in  one  of  our  District 
Courts,  of  a  man  charged  with  murder.  The  case  was  briefly 
this:  the  prisoner  had  gone,  in  execution  of  his  office  as 
constable,  to  arrest  a  slave  who  had  been  guilty  of  some  mis 
conduct,  and  bring  him  to  justice.  Expecting  opposition  in 
the  business,  the  constable  took  several  men  with  him,  some 
of  them  armed.  They  found  the  slave  on  the  plantation  of 
his  master,  within  view  of  the  house,  and  proceeded  to  seize 
and  bind  him.  His  mistress,  seeing  the  arrest,  came  down  and 
remonstrated  vehemently  against  it.  Finding  her  efforts  un 
availing,  she  went  off  to  a  barn  where  her  husband  was,  who 
was  presently  perceived  running  briskly  to  the  house.  It  was 
known  he  always  kept  a  loaded  rifle  over  his  door.  The 
constable  now  desired  his  company  to  remain  where  they  were, 
taking  care  to  keep  the  slave  in  custody,  while  he  himself  would 
go  to  the  house  to  prevent  mischief.  When  he  arrived  within 
a  short  distance  of  it,  the  master  appeared,  coming  out  of  the 
house  with  his  rifle  in  his  hand.  Some  witnesses  said  that  as 
he  came  to  the  door  he  drew  the  cock  of  the  piece,  and  was 
seen  in  the  act  of  raising  it  to  the  position  of  firing.  But  upon 
these  points  there  was  not  an  entire  agreement  in  the  evidence. 
The  constable,  standing  near  a  small  building  in  the  yard,  at  this 
instant  fired,  and  the  fire  had  a  fatal  effect.  No  previous 
malice  was  proved  against  him;  and  his  plea  upon  the  trial 
was,  that  he  had  taken  the  life  of  his  assailant  in  necessary 
self-defence. 

"  A  great  mass  of  testimony  was  delivered.  This  was  com 
mented  upon  with  considerable  ability  by  the  lawyer  for  the 
Commonwealth,  and  by  another  lawyer  engaged  by  the  friends 
of  the  deceased  for  the  prosecution.  The  prisoner  was  also 
defended,  in  elaborate  speeches,  by  two  respectable  advocates. 
These  proceedings  brought  the  day  to  a  close.  The  general 
whisper  through  the  crowded  house  was,  that  the  man  was 
guilty  and  could  not  be  saved. 

"  About  dusk  candles  were  brought,  and  Henry  arose.  His 
manner  was  exactly  that  which  '  the  British  Spy '  describes 
with  so  much  felicity;  plain,  simple,  and  entirely  unassuming. 

"  '  Gentlemen  of  the  jury/  said  he,  '  I  dare  say  we  are  all 
very  much  fatigued  with  this  tedious  trial.  The  prisoner  at  the 
bar  has  been  well  defended  already ;  but  it  is  my  duty  to 

378 


AS  A  LAWYER 

offer  you  some  further  observations  in  behalf  of  this  unfortu 
nate  man.  I  shall  aim  at  brevity.  But  should  I  take  up  more 
of  your  time  than  you  expect,  I  hope  you  will  hear  me  with 
patience  when  you  consider  that  blood  is  concerned.' 

11 1  cannot  admit  the  possibility  that  any  one,  who  never 
heard  Henry  speak,  should  be  made  fully  to  conceive  the  force 
of  impression  which  he  gave  to  these  few  words,  '  blood  is 
concerned.'  I  had  been  on  my  feet  through  the  day,  pushed 
about  in  the  crowd,  and  was  excessively  weary.  I  was  strongly 
of  opinion,  too,  notwithstanding  all  the  previous  defensive 
pleadings,  that  the  prisoner  was  guilty  of  murder,  and  I  felt 
anxious  to  know  how  the  matter  would  terminate.  Yet  when 
Henry  had  uttered  these  words,  my  feelings  underwent  an 
instantaneous  change.  I  found  everything  within  me  answering : 
'  Yes,  since  blood  is  concerned,  in  the  name  of  all  that  is 
righteous,  go  on ;  we  will  hear  you  with  patience  until  the 
rising  of  to-morrow's  sun ! ' 

"  This  bowing  of  the  soul  must  have  been  universal ;  for 
the  profoundest  silence  reigned,  as  if  our  very  breath  had 
been  suspended.  The  spell  of  the  magician  was  upon  us  all, 
and  we  stood  like  statues  around  him.  Under  the  touch  of 
his  genius,  every  particular  of  the  story  assumed  a  new  aspect, 
and  his  cause  became  continually  more  bright  and  promising. 
At  length  he  arrived  at  the  fatal  act  itself :  '  You  have  been 
told,  gentlemen,  that  the  prisoner  was  bound  by  every  obliga 
tion  to  avoid  the  supposed  necessity  of  firing  by  leaping  behind  a 
house  near  which  he  stood  at  that  moment.  Had  he  been 
attacked  with  a  club,  or  with  stones,  the  argument  would 
have  been  unanswerable,  and  I  should  feel  myself  compelled 
to  give  up  the  defence  in  despair.  But  surely  I  need  not 
tell  you,  gentlemen,  how  wide  is  the  difference  between  sticks 
or  stones  and  double-triggered,  loaded  rifles  cocked  at  your 
breast!'  The  effect  of  this  terrible  image,  exhibited  in  this 
great  orator's  peerless  manner,  cannot  be  described.  I  dare 
not  attempt  to  delineate  the  paroxysm  of  emotion  which  it 
excited  in  every  heart.  The  result  of  the  whole  was  that  the 
prisoner  was  acquitted ;  with  the  perfect  approbation,  I  believe, 
of  the  numerous  assembly  who  attended  the  trial.  What  was 
it  that  gave  such  transcendent  force  to  the  eloquence  of 
Henry?  His  reasoning  powers  were  good;  but  they  have  been 
equalled,  and  more  than  equalled,  by  those  of  many  other  men. 
His  imagination  was  exceedingly  quick,  and  commanded  all 
the  stores  of  nature  as  materials  for  illustrating  his  subject. 
His  voice  and  delivery  were  inexpressibly  happy.  But  his  most 

379 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

irresistible  charm  was  the  vivid  feeling  of  his  cause  with  which 
he  spoke.  Such  feeling  infallibly  communicates  itself  to  the 
breast  of  the  hearer." 

Here,  now,  we  come  to  a  celebrated  case  in  which 
comedy  and  tragedy  are  well  woven.  Shortly  after 
Henry  had  moved  to  Campbell  County,  says  his  grand 
son,  a  messenger  arrived,  bearing  a  letter  from  Richard 
Randolph,  then  in  Cumberland  jail  on  the  charge  of 
murder.  Mr.  Randolph  offered  him  two  hundred  and 
fifty  guineas  as  a  fee  to  defend  him.  Mr.  Henry  replied 
that  he  was  too  unwell  to  take  the  journey — quite  a  long 
one  from  Long  Island — to  Cumberland  Court-house. 
Some  days  afterward,  the  messenger  returned  with  an 
offer  of  five  hundred  guineas  as  the  fee,  and  urging 
him  to  appear  at  the  trial,  which  was  near  at  hand.  Mr. 
Henry  called  his  wife.  "  Dolly,"  said  he,  "  Mr.  Ran 
dolph  seems  very  anxious  that  I  should  appear  for 
him,  and  five  hundred  guineas  is  a  large  sum.  Don't 
you  think  I  could  make  the  trip  in  the  carriage  ?  "  Upon 
her  assenting,  the  carriage  was  brought  out,  and  he 
arrived  at  Cumberland  Court-house  in  time  for  the 
examining  court  which  convened  for  the  trial. 

Richard  Randolph  was  one  of  the  finest  of  men.  He 
lived  at  "  Bizarre,"  near  Prince  Edward  Court-house. 
Henry  knew  him  well,  and  was  fond  of  him.  John 
Randolph,  then  twenty  and  not  as  yet  "  of  Roanoke," 
was  Richard's  brother,  and  dwelt  with  him  at  "  Bizarre." 
Their  beautiful  mother,  Frances  Bland,  is  well  known 
to  story.  Her  sons  by  her  second  marriage,  which  was 
with  Judge  St.  George  Tucker,  were  almost  as  distin 
guished  as  the  odd  genius  who  owed  his  being  to  the 
first.  Here  is  William  Wirt  Henry's  account  of  the 
trial : 

"  The  charge  against  Richard  Randolph  was  the  murder  of 
a  newly-born  infant,  of  which  he  was  the  reputed  father. 

380 


AS  A  LAWYER 

The  most  intense  excitement  had  been  aroused  against  him 
in  his  county,  and  upon  his  arrest  he  had  been  refused  bail. 
Mr.  Randolph's  anxiety  for  the  result  may  be  estimated  by  the 
array  of  counsel  that  appeared  for  him.  He  was  defended  by 
Alexander  Campbell,  an  eminent  advocate,  John  Marshall 
[Chief -Justice  Marshall],  and  Patrick  Henry.  The  trial  was 
one  of  the  most  memorable  that  ever  occurred  in  Virginia.  To 
Mr.  Henry  was  assigned  the  task  of  examining  the  witnesses, 
which  he  is  said  to  have  done  with  wonderful  skill.  One  in 
cident  of  this  examination  is  traditional.  The  chief  witness 
against  the  prisoner  was  a  daughter  of  Archibald  Cary,  who 
after  her  marriage  had  lived  in  Cumberland.  It  may  be  well 
imagined  that  she  had  no  partiality  for  the  counsel  who  cross- 
examined  her.  Mr.  Henry  saw  the  necessity  of  breaking  down 
her  testimony,  and  soon  found  an  opportunity  of  doing  so.  The 
witness  testified  that  her  suspicions  had  been  aroused  concern 
ing  the  lady  involved,  and,  being  on  one  occasion  in  the  house 
with  her,  she  had  attempted  to  satisfy  her  curiosity  by  peep 
ing  through  a  crack  in  the  door  of  the  lady's  chamber  while 
she  was  undressing.  Mr.  Henry  at  once  resorted  to  his 
inimitable  power  of  exciting  ridicule  by  the  tones  of  his  voice, 
and,  in  a  manner  which  convulsed  the  audience,  asked  her : 

' '  Which  eye  did  you  peep  with  ?  ' 

"  The  laughter  in  the  court-room  aroused  the  anger  of  the 
witness,  which  was  excited  to  the  highest  pitch  when  Mr.  Henry 
turned  to  the  Court,  and  exclaimed  in  his  most  effective 
manner :  '  Great  God,  deliver  us  from  eavesdroppers  ! ' ' 

Henry's  management  of  this  witness  is  still  talked  of 
among  Virginia  lawyers.  While  luring  her  on  to  her 
own  frustration,  his  acting  was  extraordinary.  It  was 
like  a  scene  out  of  Shakespeare.  He  used  one  meaning 
for  her  and  another  for  the  audience.  She  could  not 
see  that  he  was  mocking  her,  but  everybody  else  saw  it. 
He  actually  had  her  down  on  her  knees  in  the  court 
room,  showing  how  she  peeked  through  the  crack.  He, 
too,  peeked.  He  talked  as  she  talked,  and  not  until  the 
climax  that  brought  the  outburst  of  laughter — "  Which 
eye  did  you  peep  with  ?  " — did  the  witness  realize  her 
entrapment  and  the  practical  breakdown  of  her  testi 
mony. 

38i 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

Such  was  the  comedy.  But,  though  Richard  Ran 
dolph  went  free,  his  heart  was  broken,  and  he  soon  died. 
No  doubt  John  of  Roanoke  was  embittered  by  his 
brother's  trial,  which  helped  to  develop  his  native  eccen 
tricity.  He  once  spoke  of  Henry  as  "  the  greatest  orator 
that  ever  lived."  In  his  extravagant  way,  he  added  that 
Henry  was  "  Shakespeare  and  Garrick  combined,  and 
spake  as  no  man  ever  spake."  General  William  S. 
Cabell,  of  Danville,  telling  of  an  attempt  on  Randolph's 
part  to  adequately  indicate  what  he  thought  of  Henry, 
says: 

"  Randolph  suddenly  paused,  and  picking  up  a  piece  of 
charcoal  from  the  hearth,  and  pointing  to  the  white  wall, 
said :  '  But  it  is  in  vain  for  me  to  attempt  to  describe  the  oratory 
of  that  wonderful  man.  Sir,  it  would  be  as  vain  for  me  to 
try,  with  this  black  coal,  to  paint  correctly  the  brilliant  flash 
of  the  vivid  lightning,  or  to  attempt,  with  my  feeble  voice, 
to  echo  the  thunder,  as  to  convey,  by  any  power  I  possess,  a 
proper  idea  of  the  eloquence  of  Patrick  Henry ! ' ' 

When  the  Rev.  Dr.  Archibald  Alexander,  of  Prince 
ton  Theological  Seminary,  was  a  young  man,  he  went 
out  of  his  way  to  study  Henry's  methods  as  a  speaker. 
"  The  power  of  his  eloquence  was  felt  equally  by  the 
learned  and  unlearned,"  wrote  Alexander,  in  the  Prince 
ton  Review;  hence  the  wish  of  the  beginner  in  oratory 
to  profit  by  a  lesson  from  the  lips  of  the  master.  Being 
in  Prince  Edward  County,  and  learning  that  Henry  was 
to  appear  before  the  Circuit  Court  in  defence  of  three 
men  charged  with  murder,  the  aspirant  for  pulpit  power 
sat  all  day  in  the  court-room,  awaiting  an  exhibition 
of  Henry's  eloquence.  But  the  day  was  spent  in  the 
examination  of  witnesses.  Alexander  says : 

"Mr.  Henry  .  .  .  wore  a  brown  wig,  which  exhibited 
no  indication  of  any  great  care  in  the  dressing.  Over  his 
shoulders  he  wore  a  brown  cloak.  Under  this  his  clothing 

382 


AS  A  LAWYER 

was  black,  something  the  worse  for  wear.  The  expression 
of  his  countenance  was  that  of  solemnity  and  deep  earnestness. 
His  mind  appeared  to  be  always  absorbed  in  what,  for  the 
time,  occupied  his  attention.  His  forehead  was  high  and 
spacious,  and  the  skin  of  his  face  more  than  usually  wrinkled 
for  a  man  of  fifty.  His  eyes  were  small  and  deeply  set  in  his 
head,  but  were  of  a  bright  blue  color,  and  twinkled  much 
in  their  sockets.  In  short,  Mr.  Henry's  appearance  had  nothing 
very  remarkable  as  he  sat  at  rest.  You  might  readily  have 
taken  him  for  a  common  planter  who  cared  very  little  about 
his  personal  appearance.  In  his  manners  he  was  uniformly 
respectful  and  courteous. 

"  Candles  were  brought  into  the  court-house  when  the  ex 
amination  of  witnesses  closed;  and  the  Judges  put  it  to  the 
option  of  the  bar  whether  they  would  go  on  with  the  argument 
that  night  or  adjourn  until  the  next  day.  Paul  Carrington,  Jr., 
the  attorney  for  the  State,  a  man  of  large  size  and  uncommon 
dignity  of  person  and  manner,  as  also  an  accomplished  lawyer, 
professed  his  willingness  to  proceed  immediately,  while  the 
testimony  was  fresh  in  the  minds  of  all.  Now  for  the  first 
time  I  heard  Mr.  Henry  make  anything  of  a  speech,  and  though 
it  was  short,  it  satisfied  me  of  one  thing,  which  I  had  particu 
larly  desired  to  have  decided ;  namely,  whether  like  a  player 
he  merely  assumed  the  appearance  of  feeling.  His  manner 
of  addressing  the  Court  was  profoundly  respectful.  He  would 
be  willing  to  proceed  with  the  trial,  but,  said  he :  '  My  heart 
is  so  oppressed  with  the  weight  of  responsibility  which  rests 
upon  me,  having  the  lives  of  three  fellow-citizens  depending, 
probably,  on  the  exertion  which  I  may  be  able  to  make  in 
their  behalf  (here  he  turned  to  the  prisoners  behind  him),  that 
I  do  not  feel  able  to  proceed  to-night.  I  hope  the  Court  will 
indulge  me,  and  postpone  the  trial  till  morning.'  The  impres 
sion  made  by  these  few  words  was  such  as  I  assure  myself  no 
one  can  ever  conceive  by  seeing  them  in  print.  In  the  counte 
nance,  action,  and  intonation  of  the  speaker  there  was  expressed 
such  an  intensity  of  feeling  that  all  my  doubts  were  dispelled ; 
never  again  did  I  question  whether  Henry  felt,  or  only  acted 
a  feeling.  Indeed,  I  experienced  an  instantaneous  sympathy 
with  him  in  the  emotions  which  he  expressed;  and  I  have  no 
doubt  the  same  sympathy  was  felt  by  every  hearer." 

We  continue  the  account,  quoting  in  extenso,  because 
we  certainly  have  the  real  Henry  before  us : 

383 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

"  As  a  matter  of  course,  the  proceedings  were  deferred  un 
til  the  next  morning.  I  was  early  at  my  post ;  the  Judges  were 
soon  on  the  bench,  and  the  prisoners  at  the  bar.  Mr.  Carring- 
ton,  afterwards  Judge  Carrmgton,  opened  with  a  clear  and 
dignified  speech,  and  presented  the  evidence  to  the  jury.  Every 
thing  seemed  perfectly  plain.  Two  brothers  and  a  brother-in- 
law  met  two  other  persons  in  pursuit  of  a  slave,  supposed  to 
be  harbored  by  the  brothers.  After  some  altercation  and 
mutual  abuse,  one  of  the  brothers,  whose  name  was  John  Ford, 
raised  a  loaded  gun  which  he  was  carrying,  and,  presenting 
it  to  the  breast  of  one  of  the  other  pair,  shot  him  dead  in  open 
day.  There  was  no  doubt  about  the  fact.  Indeed,  it  was  not 
denied.  There  had  been  no  other  provocation  than  opprobrious 
words.  It  is  presumed  that  the  opinion  of  every  juror  was 
made  up  from  merely  hearing  the  testimony ;  as  Tom  Harvey, 
the  principal  witness,  who  was  acting  as  constable  on  the 
occasion,  appeared  to  be  a  respectable  man.  For  the  clearer 
understanding  of  what  follows,  it  must  be  observed  that  the 
said  constable,  in  order  to  distinguish  him  from  another  of 
the  name,  was  commonly  called  '  Butterwood  Harvey,'  as  he 
lived  on  Butterwood  Creek.  .  .  .  Henry's  main  object  appeared 
to  be  throughout  to  cast  discredit  on  the  testimony  of  Tom 
Harvey.  .  .  . 

"  As  he  descanted  on  the  evidence,  he  would  often  turn  to 
Tom  Harvey — a  large,  bold-looking  man — and  with  the  most 
sarcastic  look  would  call  him  by  some  name  of  contempt: 
'  this  Butterwood  Tom  Harvey/  '  this  would-be  constable,' 
etc.  By  such  expressions,  his  contempt  for  the  man  was  com 
municated  to  the  hearers.  I  own  I  felt  it  gaining  on  me  in 
spite  of  my  better  judgment;  so  that,  before  he  was  done, 
the  impression  was  strong  on  my  mind  that  Butterwood  Harvey 
was  undeserving  the  smallest  credit.  This  impression,  how 
ever,  I  found  I  could  counteract,  the  moment  I  had  time  for 
reflection.  The  only  part  of  the  speech  in  which  he  manifested 
his  power  of  touching  the  feelings  strongly  was  where  he  dwelt 
on  the  irruption  of  the  company  into  Ford's  house,  in  circum 
stances  so  perilous  to  the  solitary  wife.  This  appeal  to  the 
sensibility  of  husbands — and  he  knew  that  all  the  jury  stood 
in  this  relation — was  overwhelming.  If  the  verdict  could  have 
been  rendered  after  this  burst  of  the  pathetic,  every  man,  at 
least  every  husband  in  the  house,  would  have  been  for  rejecting 
Harvey's  testimony,  if  not  for  hanging  him  forthwith.  It  was 
fortunate  that  the  illusion  of  such  eloquence  is  transient,  and 
is  soon  dissipated  by  the  exercise  of  sober  reason.  I  confess, 

384 


AS  A  LAWYER 

however,  that  nothing  which  I  then  heard  so  convinced  me 
of  the  advocate's  power  as  the  speech  of  five  minutes,  which 
he  made  when  he  requested  that  the  trial  might  be  postponed 
till  the  next  day." 

William  Wirt  Henry  supplements  Dr.  Alexander's 
account,  which  leaves  us  uncertain  as  to  the  result  of 
the  trial.  Ford  was  acquitted.  Juror  Halloway  used  to 
declare  that  the  terrible  Patrick  "  scared  him  out  of  his 
wits,  and  made  him  believe  that  if  he  hung  Ford  he 
would  have  to  answer  for  it  at  the  judgment  day."  But 
Dr.  Alexander's  study  of  Henry  was  not  for  the  purpose 
of  chronicling  the  minutiae  of  the  advocate's  work  at  the 
bar.  Something  more  important  was  in  mind.  Just  as 
zealous  aspirants  for  literary  fame  read  Ruskin  and 
Newman  to  waylay  the  elusive  sprites  that  guard  numer 
ous  secrets  of  style,  so  this  aspiring  pulpit  orator  sought 
to  analyze  and  adapt  the  excellences  of  Henry.  Here 
is  the  outcome  of  the  study,  which  was  made  at  various 
times  and  in  various  places : 

"  The  power  of  Henry's  eloquence  was  due,  first,  to  the 
greatness  of  his  emotion  and  passion,  accompanied  with  a 
versatility  which  enabled  him  to  assume  at  once  any  emotion 
or  passion  which  was  suited  to  his  ends.  Not  less  indispen 
sable,  secondly,  was  a  matchless  perfection  of  the  organs  of 
expression,  including  the  entire  apparatus  of  voice,  intonation, 
pause,  gesture,  attitude,  and  indescribable  display  of  countenance. 
In  no  instance  did  he  ever  indulge  in  an  expression  that  was 
not  instantly  recognized  as  nature  itself;  yet  some  of  his 
penetrating  and  subduing  tones  were  absolutely  peculiar,  and  as 
inimitable  as  they  were  indescribable.  These  were  felt  by  every 
hearer,  in  all  their  force.  His  mightiest  feelings  were  some 
times  indicated  and  communicated  by  a  long  pause,  aided  by 
an  eloquent  aspect  and  some  significant  use  of  the  finger. 

"  The  sympathy  between  mind  and  mind  is  inexplicable. 
Where  the  channels  of  communication  are  open,  the  faculty 
of  revealing  inward  passion  great,  and  the  expression  of  it 
sudden  and  visible,  the  effects  of  it  are  extraordinary.  Let 
these  shocks  of  influence  be  repeated  again  and  again,  and 

25  385 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

all  other  opinions  and  ideas  are  for  the  moment  absorbed  or 
excluded;  the  whole  mind  is  brought  into  unison  with  that  of 
the  speaker,  and  the  spell-bound  listener,  till  the  cause  ceases, 
is  under  an  entire  fascination. 

"  Patrick  Henry,  of  course,  owed  much  to  his  singular  in 
sight  into  the  feelings  of  the  common  mind.  In  great  cases, 
he  scanned  his  jury  and  formed  his  mental  estimate;  on  this 
basis  he  founded  his  appeals  to  their  predilections  and  charac 
ter.  It  is  what  other  advocates  do  in  a  lesser  degree.  When 
he  knew  that  there  were  conscientious  or  religious  men  among 
the  jury,  he  would  most  solemnly  address  himself  to  their  sense 
of  right,  and  would  adroitly  bring  in  Scriptural  citations.  If 
this  handle  were  not  offered,  he  would  lay  bare  the  sensibility 
of  patriotism.  Thus  it  was  when  he  succeeded  in  rescuing  the 
man  who  had  deliberately  shot  down  a  neighbor  who  lay  under 
the  odious  suspicion  of  being  a  Tory,  and  who  was  proved  to 
have  refused  supplies  to  a  brigade  of  the  American  army." 

But  though  Henry  left  his  mark  upon  numerous 
cases — some  great,  some  small — there  are  two  that  stand 
notably  out  from  the  others :  the  Parsons'  Cause  of  his 
youth,  and  the  judicial  affair  of  magnitude  to  which 
we  have  now  come.  This  is  known  as  the  British  Debt 
Cause.  Wirt,  who  devotes  fifty  of  the  four  hundred 
and  sixty-seven  pages  of  his  book  to  Henry's  argument 
(thus  violating  all  sense  of  biographical  proportion), 
says  that  "  the  whole  power  of  the  bar  of  Virginia  was 
embarked  "  in  the  case.  He  tells  us  that  "  the  deep 
interest  of  the  question,  in  a  national  point  of  view,  and 
the  manner  in  which  it  involved  more  particularly  the 
honor  of  the  State  of  Virginia,  and  the  fortunes  of  her 
citizens,  had  excited  Mr.  Henry  to  a  degree  of  prepara 
tion  which  he  had  never  before  made."  Howe  says: 
"  He  shut  himself  up  in  his  office  for  three  days,  during 
which  he  did  not  see  his  family ;  his  food  was  handed  by 
a  servant  through  the  office  door."  According  to  the 
Edward  Fontaine  manuscript,  Patrick  Henry  Fontaine, 
then  studying  law  with  his  grandfather,  rode  sixty  miles 
to  get  a  copy  of  Vattel's  "  Law  of  Nations."  Henry 

386 


AS  A  LAWYER 

made  many  quotations  from  Vattel,  and  "  with  the  whole 
syllabus  of  notes  and  heads  of  arguments  he  rilled  a 
manuscript  volume  more  than  an  inch  thick  and  closely 
written."  It  was  "  bound  with  leather,  and  convenient 
for  carrying  in  his  pocket."  We  learn  further  that  there 
was  an  office  in  the  yard,  "  built  at  some  distance  from 
his  dwelling,  and  an  avenue  of  fine  black  locusts  shaded 
a  walk  in  front  of  it.  ...  He  usually  walked  and 
meditated,  when  the  weather  permitted,  in  this  shaded 
avenue.  .  .  .  For  several  days  in  succession,  before 
his  departure  to  Richmond  to  attend  the  court,"  he 
haunted  the  locust  walk,  .sometimes  reading  from  his 
note-book,  and  sometimes  disclosing  by  his  gestures 
that  he  was  rehearsing  his  argument.  Wirt  declares 
that  "  he  came  forth  a  perfect  master  of  every  principle 
of  law,  national  and  municipal,  which  touched  the  sub 
ject  of  investigation  in  the  most  distant  point." 

Let  us  go  back  a  step,  in  order  that  we  may  the  more 
readily  go  forward,  and  thus  cover  the  whole  matter 
at  a  few  strides.  By  the  treaty  of  1783,  America  agreed 
that  British  debts  should  be  recoverable  here.  Under 
the  Constitution,  that  treaty  became  the  supreme  law 
of  the  land.  But  on  October  20,  1777,  Virginia,  acting 
as  a  sovereign  State,  had  directed  that  money  due  to 
British  subjects  should  be  paid  into  her  treasury.  On 
May  3,  1779,  the  Legislature  passed  an  act  of  forfeiture, 
vesting  all  British  property  in  the  Commonwealth. 
These  laws  had  been  made  prior  to  the  making  of  either 
the  treaty  or  the  Constitution. 

Now,  when  the  United  States  Court  was  opened  at 
Richmond,  in  1790,  many  British  creditors  sued  to  re 
cover  debts  that  had  already  been  paid  to  the  State. 
The  debtors  jointly  engaged  Henry,  Marshall,  James 
Innes,  and  Alexander  Campbell,  a  cousin  of  the  poet, 
to  defend  them.  The  counsel  on  the  other  side  were 
Ronald,  Baker,  Starke,  and  John  Wickham,  all  able 

387 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

men.  Wickham,  especially,  was  of  high  repute.  John 
son  and  Blair  of  the  Supreme  Court  and  Griffin  of  the 
District  Court  were  the  judges. 

Henry  qualified  in  the  Federal  Circuit  Court  on  the 
23d  of  November,  1791 ;  and  that  same  day  the  first  of 
the  British  Debt  cases  was  called.  It  led  the  docket, 
and  was  to  be  a  test  case.  William  Jones,  British  mer 
chant,  sued  Dr.  Thomas  Walker,  of  Albemarle  County, 
on  a  bond  dated  May  n,  1772.  On  the  24th,  Ronald 
and  Baker  opened  for  the  plaintiff.  On  the  morning  of 
the  25th,  Henry  began  his  great  argument,  which  in  the 
main  was  taken  down  in  short-hand  by  David  Robertson. 
We  now  follow  Wirt : 

"The  Legislature  was  then  in  session;  but  when  n  o'clock, 
the  hour  for  the  meeting  of  the  Court,  arrived,  the  Speaker 
found  himself  without  a  House  to  do  business.  All  his  author 
ity  and  that  of  his  sergeant-at-arms  were  unavailing  to  keep 
the  members  in  their  seats.  .  .  .  Accordingly,  when  the 
Court  was  ready  to  proceed  to  business,  the  court-room  of 
the  Capitol,  large  as  it  is,  was  insufficient  to  contain  the  vast 
concourse  that  was  pressing  to  enter  it.  The  portico,  and  the 
area  in  which  the  statue  of  Washington  stands,  were  filled 
with  a  disappointed  crowd,  who  nevertheless  maintained  their 
stand  without.  ...  It  may  give  the  reader  some  idea  of 
the  amplitude  of  this  argument  when  he  is  told  that  Mr. 
Henry  was  engaged  three  days  successively  in  its  delivery;  and 
some  faint  conception  of  the  enchantment  which  he  threw 
over  it,  when  he  learns  that  although  it  turned  entirely  on 
questions  of  law,  yet  the  audience,  mixed  as  it  was,  seemed 
so  far  from  being  wearied  that  they  followed  him  throughout 
with  increased  enjoyment.  The  room  continued  full  to  the 
last ;  and  such  was  '  the  listening  silence '  with  which  he  was 
heard,  that  not  a  syllable  that  he  uttered  is  believed  to  have 
been  lost.  When  he  finally  sat  down,  the  concourse  rose  with 
a  general  murmur  of  admiration;  the  scene  resembled  the 
breaking  up  and  dispersion  of  a  great  theatrical  assembly  which 
had  been  enjoying  for  the  first  time  the  exhibition  of  some 
new  and  splendid  drama;  the  Speaker  of  the  House  of  Dele 
gates  was  at  length  able  to  command  a  quorum  for  business; 
and  every  quarter  of  the  city,  and,  at  length,  every  part  of  the 

388 


AS  A  LAWYER 

State,    was   filled    with   the   echoes   of   Mr.    Henry's    eloquent 
speech." 

In  brief,  Henry  claimed  that,  by  the  law  of  nations, 
contracts  between  the  people  of  belligerent  countries 
are  void ;  that,  under  the  strain  of  a  life-and-death 
struggle,  the  debts  were  justly  confiscated;  that,  as  for 
the  treaty,  Great  Britain  had  broken  it  in  more  ways 
than  one;  and,  finally,  that  the  splitting  asunder  of  the 
two  countries  by  the  Revolution  had  annulled  a  thou 
sand  things  of  greater  human  importance  than  a  few 
pounds  and  shillings. 

During  the  debate,  Ronald,  who  was  a  Scotchman, 
let  slip  a  reference  to  Virginia  as  a  "  revolted  "  colony. 
"  When  Mr.  Henry,"  says  Wirt,  "  came  to  notice  this 
remark,  he  gave  his  spectacles  the  war  cant:  '  But  an 
other  observation/  said  he,  '  was  made :  that  by  the  law 
of  nations  we  had  not  a  right  to  legislate  on  the  subject 
of  British  debts — we  were  not  an  independent  nation — 
and  I  thought/  said  he,  raising  himself  aloft,  while 
his  frame  dilated  beyond  the  ordinary  size,  '  that  I  heard 
the  word  revolt ('  At  this  word  he  turned  upon  Mr. 
Ronald  his  piercing  eye,  and  knit  his  brows  at  him,  with 
an  expression  of  indignation  and  contempt  which  seemed 
almost  to  annihilate  him.  It  was  like  a  stroke  of  light 
ning."  Ronald  seemed,  indeed,  to  be  "  in  quest  of  an 
auger-hole  by  which  he  might  drop  through  the  floor." 
Henry  "  perceived  his  sufferings,  and  his  usual  good 
nature  immediately  returned  to  him.  He  raised  his 
eyes  gently  toward  the  Court,  and  shaking  his  head 
slowly,  with  an  expression  of  regret,  added :  '  I  wish  I 
had  not  heard  it:  for  though  innocently  meant  (and 
I  am  sure  it  was  so,  from  the  character  of  the  gentleman 
who  mentioned  it),  yet  the  sound' displeases  me — it  is 
unpleasant.'  Mr.  Ronald  breathed  again,  and  looked 
up,  and  his  generous  adversary  dismissed  the  topic  to 

389 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

In  the  fall  of  1792  the  same  court  heard  a  discussion 
"  upon  the  law  involved  in  the  pleadings  " ;  and  in  the 
spring  of  1793  there  was  further  argument — this  time 
before  Chief- Justice  Jay  and  Associate  Justice  Iredell 
of  the  United  States  Supreme  Court,  sitting  with  Judge 
Griffin  of  the  District  Court.  James  Iredell,  of  North 
Carolina,  a  great  jurist  and  one  of  the  strong  men  of  his 
time  (whose  "  Life  "  by  G.  J.  McRee  is  a  true  lamp  of 
Revolutionary  history),  wrote  to  his  wife  on  May  27: 
"  We  began  on  the  British  causes  the  second  day  of 
the  Court,  and  are  now  in  the  midst  of  them.  The  great 
Patrick  Henry  is  to  speak  to-day." 

How  Henry  impressed  Iredell  was  thus  noted  in  a 
letter  from  James  W.  Bouldin  to  Colonel  John  Henry, 
of  Red  Hill : 

"  John  Randolph  of  Roanoke  told  me  of  his  having  when 
a  youth  been  present  at  the  trial  of  the  case  of  the  British 
debts.  He  said  by  luck  or  favor  he  had  got  himself  seated  near 
the  Judges,  so  that  he  could  hear  a  whisper  between  them.  A 
dispute  sprang  up  between  them  whether  Henry  was  an  orator. 
The  Associate  Judge  [Iredell]  asserted  that  he  was  no  orator, 
though  he  had  never  heard  him  speak — that  he  was  a  mere  ad 
captandum  speaker.  The  Chief-Justice  insisted  that  he  was  the 
greatest  of  orators.  John  Marshall,  afterwards  Chief-Justice 
.  .  .  opened,  and  was  speaking.  The  dispute  was  so  severe 
between  the  Judges  that  they  determined  to  call  on  Mr.  Henry 
next,  although  they  knew  he  was  reserved  to  the  last.  When 
Marshall  finished  .  .  .  they  called  on  Mr.  Henry.  Henry 
was  very  much  wrapped  up,  was  old,  and  his  head  resting  on  the 
bar.  He  raised  his  head  with  unaffected  surprise,  and  said  that 
that  was  not  the  order  in  which  they  had  proposed  to  speak. 
There  were  several  of  counsel.  .  .  .  The  Court  still  in 
sisting,  Henry  began  to  resign  himself  to  it,  and  prepared  to 
rise.  Randolph  said  he  knew  that  Henry  was  the  ablest  counsel 
and  mainly  relied  on.  .  Yet  '  his  deceit  was  deeper  than  the 
bottom  of  the  sea' — his  (Henry's)  oratorical  put-on,  he  meant; 
and  when  Henry  began  to  complain,  before  he  had  fairly  risen 
from  his  seat,  that  it  was  a  hardship  too  great  to  place  the  labor 
ing  oar  in  the  hands  of  a  decrepit  old  man,  trembling  with  one 

390 


AS  A  LAWYER 

foot  in  the  grave,  weak  in  his  best  days,  and  far  inferior  to  the 
able  associate  by  him,  he  (Randolph)  knew  '  it  was  all  deceit.' 
.  .  .  He  now  reminded  Randolph  of  a  first-rate  four-mile 
race-horse,  sometimes  displaying  his  whole  power  and  speed 
for  a  few  leaps,  and  then  taking  up  again.  Here  the  color 
would  come  and  go  in  the  face  of  the  Chief-Justice,  while 
the  Associate  Justice  sat  with  eyes  stretched  open  in  perfect 
wonder.  At  last  Henry  arrived  at  his  utmost  height  and 
grandeur.  He  raised  his  hands  in  one  of  those  grand,  solemn 
pauses.  Randolph  said  his  hands  seemed  to  cover  the  whole 
house.  There  was  a  general  suppressed  expression  of  applause. 
Then  the  Associate  Justice  cried  out :  '  Gracious  God !  He  is 
an  orator  indeed ! ' ' 

Iredell  subsequently  wrote  of  the  arguments :  "  They 
have  discovered  an  ingenuity,  a  depth  of  investigation, 
and  a  power  of  reasoning  fully  equal  to  anything  I  have 
ever  witnessed,  and  some  of  them  have  been  adorned 
with  a  splendor  of  eloquence  surpassing  what  I  ever 
felt  before.  Fatigue  has  given  way  under  its  influence, 
and  the  heart  has  been  warmed,  while  the  understanding 
has  been  instructed." 

William  Wirt  Henry  thus  follows  the  case  to  its  end : 

"  The  decision  of  the  Court  upon  the  pleadings  left  nothing 
for  the  jury  to  try  except  the  plea  of  payment.  Upon  this 
issue  the  jury  was  impanelled  at  once,  and  argument  was 
heard,  but  they  could  not  agree  upon  a  verdict.  Nor  was  one 
obtained  until  the  May  term,  1794,  when  Mr.  Henry  was  not 
present.  By  the  pleadings,  the  defendants  had  been  allowed 
credit  for  the  sums  they  had  paid  into  the  State  treasury.  From 
this,  Ware  [administrator  of  Jones]  appealed  to  the  Supreme 
Court,  where  the  case  was  heard  after  Mr.  Henry  had  left 
the  bar.  That  Court  reversed  the  Circuit  Court,  and  held  the 
debtors  liable  for  their  original  obligations,  on  the  ground 
that  the  treaty,  being  the  supreme  law  under  the  Constitution, 
annulled  the  acts  of  Virginia,  though  she  might  have  been 
sovereign  when  they  were  passed." 

And  so,  with  a  triumph,  Henry  passed  out  of  the 
courts  as  he  had  passed  out  of  the  public  councils.  He 

391 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

deemed  himself  entitled  to  some  peace  and  rest.  He  had 
injured  his  voice  in  the  British  Debt  case ;  which  was 
but  one  of  many  warnings  that  his  day  of  great  activity 
had  gone.  We  learn  from  Howe  that,  in  the  course  of 
the  arguments  before  the  Supreme  Court  judges,  the 
Countess  of  Huntingdon,  then  in  this  country,  was 
among  the  auditors.  She  said  of  Henry  and  the  others 
that  if  they  had  spoken  thus  in  Westminster  Hall,  "  they 
would  have  been  honored  with  a  peerage."  "  Mr. 
Henry,"  continues  Howe,  "  had  a  diamond  ring  on  his 
finger;  and  while  he  was  speaking,  the  Countess  ex 
claimed  to  the  Judge,  Iredell :  '  The  diamond  is 
blazing!'  " 

And  so,  doubtless,  it  will  continue  to  blaze;  for 
Henry's  fame  as  an  orator  will  last  through  the  cen 
turies. 


392 


, 

• 
XVII 

RED    HILL 

WITH  enough  of  that  honor  which  comes  to  one  who 
acts  well  his  part;  with  friends  enough,  and  no  real 
enemies ;  with  land  and  money  enough,  but,  as  he  seems 
to  have  thought,  not  quite  enough  children — Henry 
turned  his  back  upon  the  world,  and  entered  the  beauti 
ful  wilderness  that  stretched  eastward  from  the  Peaks 
of  Otter.  A  few  Indians  were  still  there,  and  many 
bears.  High  hills,  free-flowing  streams,  and  fertile 
lowlands  made  it  an  inviting  region  for  Henry,  who 
now  lacked  nothing  but  health.  Here  he  hoped  to  get 
back  his  health ;  here  he  would  rest ;  here  he  would  play 
patriarch,  and  prolong  his  life. 

It  is  a  Randolph,  -as  well  as  a  Henry,  region — this 
bold  country  along  the  Staunton  River.  The  Otter 
comes  out  from  among  the  Peaks,  and  feeds  the  Staun 
ton  ;  the  Staunton  feeds  the  Dan ;  the  Dan  the  Roanoke. 
It  is  said  that  John  Randolph  spent  a  night  on  one  of 
the  Peaks  that  he  might  seek  in  the  sunrise  sure  evi 
dence  of  the  existence  of  God.  He  went  up  the  moun 
tain  in  pride,  and  came  down  in  humility.  Whether 
Satan  sat  beside  him  on  the  rock  of  his  vigil  that  night, 
we  can  only  imagine,  but  we  feel  that  he  was  lucky  to 
escape  the  rattlesnakes.  His  head  was  surcharged  with 
Shakespeare — a  complaint  that  was  common  in  the 
generation  succeeding  Henry's,  and  that  is  exceedingly 
rare  in  ours.  No  doubt  he  thought  dark,  Byronic  things 
on  his  perch  among  the  Peaks.  No  doubt  he  gave 
"  Hamlet  "  to  the  stars,  and  "  Macbeth  "  and  the  other 
pieces.  If,  after  sunrise,  he  chanced  to  look  eastward 
through  his  spy-glass,  he  saw  the  quarter  of  his  own 

393 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

far-away  forest  hermitage ;  and  if  he  focused  upon  the 
nearer  spot  where  the  Otter  joins  the  Staunton,  he 
was  viewing  the  Patrick  Henry  neighborhood. 

Not  far  from  the  confluence  of  these  two  rivers  was 
Long  Is^nd,  the  earliest  of  Henry's  Staunton  Valley 
homes.  Red  Hill,  the  real  home,  \vas  eighteen  miles 
down  stream,  near  the  head  of  bateau  navigation  to 
the  sea.  Here,  ?fter  receiving  the  waters  of  the  Fall 
ing  River,  which  wash  the  western  side  of  Red  Hill, 
the  Staunton  quits  its  eastward  course,  elbows  south, 
and  speeds  away  for  the  Carolina  line.  Here,  on  Red 
Hill,  the  counties  of  Campbell  and  Charlotte  meet ;  and 
the  crow  that  flies  over  stream  from  either  is  soon 
eating  corn  in  Halifax.  Thirty-eight  miles  to  the  north 
west  is  Lynchburg;  some  thirty  to  the  north  is  Appo- 
mattox.  The  sound  of  the  guns  there  reached  Red  Hill, 
but  though  Henry  had  once  been  profoundly  interested 
in  the  matter  at  issue,  he  slept  on.  After  Appomattox, 
a  native  remarked  to  a  Union  officer,  an  excellent  but 
uninformed  man,  who  was  guarding  a  plantation : 
"  This  is  Patrick  Henry's  country  around  here."  "  So 
I've  heard  say,"  replied  the  officer ;  "  he  must  be  '  some 
pumpkins  ' ;  where  does  he  live,  anyhow  ?  "  * 

For  a  time  Henry  kept  up  two  residences,  going  from 
Long  Island  to  Red  Hill  and  back  again  whenever  he 
wished.  As  we  have  seen,  he  was  in  search  of  health 
and  comfort ;  and  doubtless  he  sought  physic  in  wood- 

*In  Powhatan  Bouldin's  little  book,  "The  Old  Trunk,  or 
Sketches  of  Colonial  Days,"  one  finds  interesting  reminiscences 
of  the  Red  Hill  region.  When  Louis  Tyler  lived  at  "  Red  Hill 
in  Charlotte,"  he  had  as  a  servant  a  white  redemptioner, 
"  an  upright  woman  of  great  fidelity,"  Milly  Collins.  "  One 
night,  as  Mrs.  Tyler  was  preparing  to  retire  to  bed,  she,  as 
usual,  requested  Milly  to  pull  off  her  stockings.  '  Everybody 
pulls  off  their  own  stockings  to-night ! '  was  the  reply.  Pretty 
bold  for  her;  but  the  hour  of  her  deliverance  had  come,  and 
she  meant  to  assert  her  rights  that  very  instant." 

394 


RED  HILL 

land  sport.  Judge  Roane  intimates  that  Henry  had 
lost  all  liking  for  rod  and  gun ;  but  that  was  when  he 
was  on  the  circuit  and  working  hard.  Now  he  was 
free,  and  local  tradition  has  it  that  he  renewed  his 
interest  in  the  chase.  In  these  days  of  his  retirement, 
he  was  as  fond  of  nature  as  he  had  ever  been.  He 
was  no  Puritan,  be  it  noted,  but  a  religious  man  of 
affairs,  and  he  saw  the  utility  and  the  joy  of  rural  pas 
times.  Like  John  Randolph,  Patrick  Henry's  son  Win 
ston  kept  race-horses  on  his  Staunton  River  estate. 
Dr.  Thomas  Yuille  Henry,  son  of  Winston,  made  a 
name  for  himself  in  the  hunting  field.  Fox-hounds  are 
closely  identified  with  the  Henry  family,  and  there  is 
a  breed  of  them  bearing  the  name.  That  Patrick 
Henry  himself  "  did  pursue  the  timid  hare,  and  fox 
that  lives  by  subtilty,"  we  may  well  believe  without 
stretching  our  imagination  beyond  the  limit.  By  the 
Staunton  there  still  dwells  a  half-breed  Indian  woman 
who  remembers  tales  told  by  her  father  of  the  days  when 
he  hunted  with  Patrick  Henry.  Long  Island  is  in  foot- 
touch  with  Red  Hill,  and  the  plantation  hands  fre 
quently  passed  to  and  fro  between  them.  One  of  these, 
"  Uncle  Big  Solomon,"  while  walking  to  Long  Island 
by  night,  met  a  bear  at  a  fence  near  the  ford.  Mis 
taking  the  bear  for  a  man,  "  Uncle  Big  Solomon  "  pro 
ceeded  to  scuffle  with  him ;  and,  says  tradition,  "  the 
best  man  got  over  the  fence  last." 

Several  of  Henry's  letters  are  dated  at  Long  Island, 
Campbell  County,  which  county,  by  the  by,  was  named 
in  honor  of  his  brother-in-law,  General  William  Camp 
bell  ;  others  bear  the  date,  "  Red  Hill,  Charlotte  County." 
One  of  these  letters  shows  that  Henry  was  living  at 
Long  Island  as  early  as  October  26,  1793.  It  is  to  his 
daughter,  "  Betsy "  Aylett,  who  dwelt  in  King  Wil 
liam.  There  is  that  in  the  letter  which  brings  us  close 
to  the  writer,  who  says : 

395 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

"  Yours  by  Mr.  Roane's  man  I  received,  and  I  have  the 
satisfaction  to  inform  you  we  are  well,  except  Johnny  Chris 
tian  and  Patrick,  and  they  are  recovering  fast  now.  Poor 
Neddy  has  been  at  the  point  of  death  at  Colonel  Meredith's. 
Your  sister  Fountaine  and  Dolly  have  been  with  him  for  some 
time.  He  was  mended  a  little  when  we  last  heard  from  him, 
and  there  were  hopes  of  his  living — and  I  trust  he  mends, 
or  we  should  have  heard  before  this.  I  should  have  gone  to 
him,  but  had  a  pain  in  my  hip.  The  flux  has  been  very  near 
us,  but,  it  has  pleased  God,  we  escaped  it.  Many  died  of 
it,  and  the  whole  country  hereabouts  has  been  sickly.  Your 
mama  and  myself  are  greatly  obliged  by  your  affection  to 
Dolly,  and  I  send  a  guinea  by  your  sister  Roane  to  pay  for 
some  small  articles  she  had  from  a  store  at  Aylett's,  which  she 
says  were  twenty  odd  shillings.  Your  sister  Roane  can  tell 
you  the  little  news  of  this  family.  We  shall  go  to  Red  Hill, 
18  miles  below  this,  in  a  few  days,  to  spend  eight  months,  but 
spend  the  sickly  season  here.  ...  I  pray  God  to  keep  and 
preserve  you,  my  dear  child." 

In  the  autumn  of  1794  he  writes  to  "  Betsy  " : 

"  I  have  great  cause  of  thankfulness  for  the  health  I  enjoy, 
and  for  that  of  your  mama  and  all  the  children.  For  not  one 
of  us  has  been  sick  for  a  long  time.  Our  working  negroes 
on  the  river  are  indeed  very  sickly  with  the  ague.  However, 
it  is  not  of  an  inveterate  kind.  We  have  providentially  escaped 
the  flux  as  yet,  whilst  many  around  us  have  died  of  it.  I 
wish  you  were  here  to  enjoy  the  agreeable  society  of  your 
sisters  at  this  place,  which  is  very  retired ;  indeed,  so  much  so  as 
to  disgust  Sally  and  Dolly.  But  as  we  go  to  Red  Hill  in 
August  for  five  weeks,  they  will  be  relieved  from  this  solitude, 
as  that  is  a  more  public  place.  .  .  .  We  have  another  son, 
named  Winston.  I  must  give  out  the  law,  and  plague  myself 
no  more  with  business,  sitting  down  with  what  I  have.  For 
it  will  be  sufficient  employment  to  see  after  my  little  flock,  and 
the  management  of  my  plantation." 

However  much  Henry  liked  Long1  Island,  he  liked 
Red  Hill  better.  He  said  to  "  Jack  White,"  a  favorite 
servant,  that  in  finding  Red  Hill  he  had  found  "  one  of 
the  garden  spots  of  the  world."  Thus  it  came  that  in 
1796  he  fixed  his  residence  at  Red  Hill,  leaving  the 
Long  Island  plantation  in  charge  of  an  agent.  And 

396 


,/, 
*   2; 

i  3 


RED  HILL 

since  Red  Hill  was  his  last  home,  becoming  more  inti 
mately  associated  with  his  name  than  any  other  place, 
it  behooves  us  to  draw  near  and  look  minutely  upon 
this  particular  "  garden  spot  "  which  rejoiced  him  so. 
As  with  other  pilgrims,  we  approach  from  the  north, 
by  the  Brookneal  road,  which  leads  through  woods 
rich  in  all  sorts  of  oak,  hickory,  ash,  chestnut,  poplar, 
and  pine,  and  brings  us  finally  to  the  far-extending 
Red  Hill  open.  We  are  on  the  backbone  of  a  broad 
ridge,  with  pasture  fields  to  the  west  and  a  tobacco 
field  sloping  eastward.  On  ahead  are  the  houses.  They 
are  at  the  nib  of  the  ridge — barn,  cabins,  agent's  dwell 
ing,  and  Red  Hill  house  itself;  not  close  together,  but 
picturesquely  placed,  for  there  is  no  lack  of  room  here. 
Originally  the  tract  was  of  two  thousand  acres.*  As 
we  move  on,  we  note  that  there  are  all  sorts  of  pretty 
little  hillocks  tumbled  slopewise  about  on  top  of  the 
big  hill.  We  say  to  ourselves  that  if  it  were  to  rain 
hard,  little  streams  of  water  would  soon  be  running 
to  all  points  of  the  compass  at  one  and  the  same  moment. 
Some  would  hurry  to  Falling  River,  in  the  rocky  trough 
just  to  the  west;  some  would  flow  eastward  into  a 
lesser  stream.  Such  is  the  variety  of  contour ;  such  are 
the  gentle  dips  and  curves  and  graceful  sweeps  of  the 
land  at  Red  Hill,  which  was  so  named  because  of  the 
red-brown  soil  outcropping  at  it's  southern  end.  To 
boatmen  coming  up  the  Staunton,  in  the  old  days,  this 
southern  end  looked  like  a  red  bluff;  but  it  is  a  brown 
hill,  a  white  hill,  or  a  gloriously  green  hill,  according 
to  the  season.  Thinking  of  Patrick  Henry 's  choice 
of  a  home — his  "  garden  spot  "  of  the  world — we  find 
one  of  his  chief  characteristics,  hitherto  shadowy  to 
us,  now  relieved  of  shadows.  We  see  clearly  that  the 

*The  Red  Hill  tract  contained  2920  acres;  the  Long  Island 
tract  3522  acres.  Two  other  tracts,  in  Campbell  County,  were 
owned  by  Henry — one  of  1030  acres,  the  other  of  444  acres. 
Henry  paid  taxes  on  8000  acres  of  Norfolk  lands, 

397 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

man  had  the  artistic  temperament.  He  was  musical; 
we  recall  his  flute  and  violin.  He  was  an  actor;  no 
one  has  ever  thought  otherwise.  In  a  sense,  he  was 
an  artist ;  we  understand  now  why  many  of  his  descend 
ants  developed  aesthetic  qualities.  Certainly,  his  eye 
must  have  had  satisfaction  of  pastoral  scenery  here. 
What  is  called  "  quiet  beauty,"  "  restful  beauty,"  is 
round  about;  and  one  finds  himself  listening  for  the 
tinkle  of  sheep-bells.  The  mind  goes  back  to  poems 
read  and  stories  told  of  pastoral  England,  and  this 
seems  a  part  of  it,  somehow,  or,  at  any  rate,  a  part  of 
some  place,  somewhere,  connected  with  pleasant  memo 
ries  or  happy  dreams. 

Patrick  Henry's  house  faces  south.  It  stands  on 
the  crest  of  the  hill,  at  the  right  spot  for  the  longest 
and  best  view  down  the  valley  of  the  Staunton.  In  a 
shaded  yard  back  of  the  house  was  his  office;  to  the 
east  is  the  spacious  garden ;  east  of  that  is  the  grave 
yard,  walled  about  with  box-tree  hedge  and  carpeted 
with  periwinkle.  Box-tree  hedge  beautifies  the  lawn, 
from  the  foot  of  which  the  hillside  slopes  a  long  way 
down  to  the  Staunton  lowland,  where  there  are  great 
flat  fields  given  over  to  corn.  There  are  eight  con 
siderable  springs,  one  with  a  touch  of  lithia,  round  about 
the  place.  The  ravines,  with  tHeir  whitewashed  log 
cabins,  are  romantic,  and  at  the  heads  of  these  ravines 
are  the  springs.  "  Cool  Spring  "  was  Henry's  favorite. 
From  this,  water  was  brought  to  him  on  a  summer 
day;  and  with  a  can  of  it  and  a  gourd  he  sat  under  a 
locust  tree  on  the  lawn,  and  enjoyed  the  valley  view. 

Looking  as  with  Henry's  own  eyes,  we  have  a  pros 
pect  down  across  miles  of  corn  to  the  far-away  hills 
of  Halifax.  The  whole  basin,  which  is  oval  in  shape, 
is  rimmed  about  with  hills.  At  the  furthermost  rim, 
where  the  river  runs  in  rapids,  breaking  through  the 
hills,  is  a  wooded  eminence  called  Hawk's  Mountain, 

398 


ffi 
r 


RED  HILL 

three  miles  away.  All  the  space  between  is  as  a  pano 
rama  where  clouds  and  hills  and  sweeps  of  corn  play 
shadow-games,  shifting  their  pictures  constantly,  prodi 
gal  of  them,  indeed — giving  to  some  thief  of  a  crow 
that  happens  to  fly  by  so  glorious  a  setting  that  an  artist 
would  be  willing  to  lay  aside  his  brush  for  good,  if 
he  could  only  paint  it  as  it  is. 

"  From  the  brow  of  the  hill,  west  of  the  house," 
wrote  Howe,  who  visited  it  sixty  years  ago,  "  is  a  scene 
of  an  entirely  different  character ;  the  Blue  Ridge,  with 
the  lofty  Peaks  of  Otter,  appears  in  the  horizon  at  a 
distance  of  nearly  sixty  miles."  The  print  used  by 
Howe  in  his  "  Historical  Collections "  shows  a  two- 
story  frame  dwelling  connected  at  the  eastern  end  with 
a  snug  story-and-a-half  colonial  structure.  The  two- 
story  part  was  added  after  Henry's  death.  It  is  the 
smaller  building  that  was  his.  He  himself  made  but  one 
addition — a  shed  at  the  garden  end ;  and  this  was  built, 
not  so  much  because  he  needed  more  room  for  his  still 
growing  family — John,  who  inherited  Red  Hill,  and 
Jean  Robertson  were  born  here — as  because  he  "  wished 
to  hear  the  patter  of  rain  on  its  roof."  We  are  assured 
by  Elizabeth  Henry  Lyons  that  "  Red  Hill  has  suffered 
less  change  than  any  other  historic  home  in  Virginia. 
The  house,  a  wooden  structure,  is  in  an  excellent  state 
of  preservation.  It  is  composite  in  its  nature,  an  addi 
tion  having  been  made  to  it  by  John  Henry,  to  whom 
it  passed  on  the  death  of  his  mother.  The  box-hedges 
which  mark  the  walks  and  driveways,  and  the  old- 
fashioned  garden  with  flowering  shrubs,  give  the  place 
a  distinct  flavor  of  ante-bellum  days.  The  wood-work 
inside  the  house  is  very  simple.  Tall  mantels  and  brass 
locks  show  its  colonial  character."  * 

*  Mrs.  Lucy  Gray  Harrison  and  Mrs.  Elizabeth  Henry  Lyons, 
daughters  of  William  Wirt  Henry,  are  the  present  owners  of 
Red  Hill.  Mrs.  Harrison  is  the  widow  of  Matthew  Bland 

399 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

Henry's  life  at  Red  Hill  was  just  the  sort  of  life 
that  world-badgered  men  everywhere  sigh  to  lead.  We 
know  that  Washington  so  sighed  about  this  time.  It 
might  be  described  as  idyllic,  if  it  were  not  that  the 
word  conveys  too  florid  a  meaning.  It  might  be  desig 
nated  as  a  patriarchal  life,  if  it  were  not  for  the  fact 
that  the  cradles  were  still  rocking  at  Red  Hill.  It  was 
indeed  patriarchal  in  the  sense  that  Henry  was  looking 
after  his  people,  his  flocks,  his  fields.  But  his  varied 
affairs  were  not  all  under  his  immediate  eye.  In  going 
over  the  private  papers  preserved  at  Red  Hill,  one  is 
impressed  with  his  business  activity.  He  touched  life 
at  many  points.  There  are  drawerfuls  of  receipts, 
accounts,  business  letters,  documents  relating  to  sur 
veys  and  the  like — all  showing  how  careful  he  was,  and 
that  his  days  at  Red  Hill  could  not  have  been  without 
care.  Howe  says :  "  Occasionally  he  walked  to  and 
fro  in  the  yard  from  one  clump  of  trees  to  the  other, 
buried  in  revery,  at  which  times  he  was  never  inter 
rupted."  It  may  be  that  he  was  thinking  of  the  great 
trouble  President  Washington  was  having;  or  it  is 
possible  that  certain  land  investments  were  about  to 
prove  profitless.  He  lost  his  share  in  a  Georgia  tract 
by  reason  of  the  McGillivray  treaty  between  the  United 
States  and  the  Creeks,  and  was  a  victim — not  a  bene 
ficiary,  as  has  been  foolishly  said — of  the  Yazoo  Fraud 
of  I795-* 

Harrison,  the  upbuilder  of  Duluth,  Minn.  Mrs.  Lyons  is  the 
wife  of  Colonel  James  Lyons,  great-grandson  of  Judge  Peter 
Lyons,  Patrick  Henry's  opponent  in  the  "  Parsons'  Cause." 
As  remodelled  on  colonial  lines — the  old  preserved,  the  new 
subdued — the  present  house  fits  the  hill-top,  graces  it,  and 
becomes  the  ornament  of  the  historic  plantation.  Like  Mount 
Vernon,  it  is  a  Mecca  for  all  who  love  the  founders  of  the 
Republic.  Red  Hill  garden  has  been  stocked  with  shrubs 
from  Mount  Vernon  garden. 

*  Jefferson   wrote,   in   the   "  Memorandum,"   thrown   out  by 
400 


RED  HILL 

But  in  the  main,  as  he  told  "  Jack  White,"  he  was 
"  getting  things  ready  for  his  children."  He  bought 
farms  for  his  older  sons,  and  helped  his  married  daugh- 

Wirt  and  first  published  in  1867 :  "  About  the  close  of  the  war 
he  [Patrick  Henry]  engaged  in  the  Yazoo  speculation,  and 
bought  up  a  great  deal  of  depreciated  paper  at  2s.,  and  2s.  6d., 
in  the  pound  to  pay  for  it.  At  the  close  of  the  war  many  of 
us  wished  to  reopen  all  accounts  which  had  been  paid  in 
depreciated  money,  and  have  them  settled  by  the  scale  of 
depreciation.  But  on  this  he  frowned  most  indignantly,  and, 
knowing  the  general  indisposition  of  the  Legislature,  it  was 
considered  hopeless  to  attempt  it  with  such  an  opponent  at 
their  head  as  Henry.  .  .  .  From  being  the  most  violent  of 
the  Anti-Federalists,  however,  he  was  brought  over  to  the  new 
Constitution  by  his  Yazoo  speculation,  before  mentioned.  The 
Georgia  Legislature  having  declared  that  transaction  fraudu 
lent  and  void,  the  depreciated  paper  which  he  had  bought  up 
to  pay  for  the  Yazoo  purchase  was  likely  to  remain  on  his 
hands  worth  nothing.  But  Hamilton's  funding  system  came 
most  opportunely  to  his  relief,  and  suddenly  raised  his  paper 
from  2s.  6d.  to  275.  6d.  the  pound.  Hamilton  became  now  his 
idol."  Commenting  on  this,  William  Wirt  Henry  says :  "  The 
facts  are  simply  as  follows :  On  the  7th  of  February,  1795, 
the  Georgia  Legislature  passed  an  act  selling  to  four  companies, 
viz. :  the  Georgia,  the  Georgia  and  Mississippi,  the  Upper 
Mississippi,  and  the  Tennessee — about  forty  million  acres  of 
land  for  the  sum  of  $500,000.  These  companies  paid  the  money, 
and  obtained  the  deeds  to  the  land.  It  soon  became  known, 
however,  that  the  Legislature  had  been  bribed,  and  the  suc 
ceeding  Legislature,  on  the  3Oth  of  January,  1796,  declared  the 
grant  fraudulent  and  void.  This  transaction  became  infamous, 
and  was  known  as  the  Yazoo  speculation ;  and  it  is  with  this 
that  Mr.  Jefferson  evidently  intends  to  connect  Mr.  Henry. 
I  find  from  Mr.  Henry's  private  papers  that  late  in  the  year 
1789,  he,  with  Judge  Paul  Carrington,  Joel  Watkins,  Francis 
Watkins,  and  some  half  dozen  other  gentlemen — all  of  high 
character — entered  into  a  co-partnership,  which  they  called 
the  Virginia  Yazoo  Company,  having  for  their  object  the 
purchase  of  Georgia  lands.  In  1789  the  Georgia  Legislature 
passed  an  act  to  sell  to  the  South  Carolina,  the  Virginia  Yazoo, 
and  the  Tennessee  Companies  a  portion  of  her  territory.  But 
refusing  to  take  Georgia  certificates  in  payment,  and  requiring 

26  401 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

ters.  There  were  some  weddings  at  Red  Hill ;  for  the 
daughters  by  his  second  marriage  were  now  growing 
up.  The  eldest,  Dorothea  Spotswood,  a  beauty,  became 
the  wife  of  her  cousin,  George  D.  Winston.  Her  por 
trait  by  James  Sharpies  is  much  prized.  Dorothea's 
sister,  Martha  Catharine,  then  seventeen,  fell  over 
board  while  visiting  the  Henrys,  distant  kinsmen  on  the 
Eastern  Shore  of  Virginia,  and  romantically  married  her 
rescuer,  Edward  W.  Henry,  a  son  of  Judge  James 
Henry  of  the  Court  of  Appeals.  Sarah  married  Robert 
Campbell,  of  Charlotte  Court-house.  Robert's  brother, 
Thomas  Campbell,  the  famous  poet,  was  under  engage 
ment  to  come  to  Red  Hill  as  tutor,  but  was  overruled 
at  home,  and  never  crossed  the  sea. 

Henry  himself  sometimes  played  school-master.  This 
we  learn  from  William  Wirt  Henry,  who  had  from  his 
Aunt  Sarah  an  interesting  detail  respecting  Patrick 
Henry's  family  customs.  It  was  his  habit,  said  she,  to 
seat  himself  in  his  dining-room  every  morning,  directly 
after  rising,  and  read  his  Bible,  and  as  his  children 
would  pass  him  for  the  first  time,  he  would  raise  his 
eyes  from  his  book  and  greet  them  with  a  "  good 

specie  instead,  the  companies  could  not  pay  for  the  land,  and 
their  rights  were  afterwards  declared  forfeited.  No  improper 
conduct  can  be  charged  on  the  Virginia  Yazoo  Company  in  this 
transaction.  They  paid  no  money  and  got  no  land.  .  .  . 
I  have  never  seen  the  slightest  evidence  that  Mr.  Henry  was 
connected  with  any  other  company,  nor  am  I  aware  that  this 
was  ever  charged."  John  Randolph,  the  bitterest  foe  of  the 
actual  promoters  of  the  Yazoo  Frauds,  said  of  Colonel  Joel 
Watkins,  one  of  the  Virginia  Company :  "  Under  the  guidance 
of  old-fashioned  honesty  and  practical  good  sense  he  accu 
mulated  an  ample  fortune,  in  which  it  is  firmly  believed  by 
all  who  knew  him  there  was  not  a  dirty  shilling"  Watkins, 
be  it  noted,  was  Henry's  partner.  As  for  the  funding  act,  it 
had  nothing  to  do  with  the  matter.  This  act  had  been  in  opera 
tion  six  years  before  the  frauds  developed.  Jefferson  mixes 
his  dates.  Nor  did  Henry  idolize  Hamilton,  or  any  other  man. 

402 


DOROTHEA   SPOTSVVOOD    HENRY 

(Dorothea,  daughter  of  Patrick  Henry,  married  her  cousin,  George  D. 
Winston.  She  was  eighteen  when  this  portrait  was  painted  by  Sharpies 
the  English  artist.) 


THE      NEW 

TESTAMENT 

Of  our  LORD  and  SAVIOUR 

JESUS  CHRIST 

Newly  T  R  A  N  s  L  A,  r  E'D  out  of  the 

0  R  I  G  IN  A  L  Cfe  R  fi  E  K^ 

,     And  .with  tlie  former 

TRANSLATIONS 


V.-*- 


Klleently 


/MU'E  £>  'Til'St'  Llr. 


f^f    l{r:,-.\  1:;    CJ1  L'  R 
'"•:\  -^    j    ,:•     -     - 


,     K'-D   'I.    Nt  JJ     U     R     G     ll  : 

PHntcd  by  At.  EX.\N  or.  u    Kix^Xjo,  His  iSIajt-ilj'.s  Printer; 
MDCtLX-XV.        .          % 


TITLE-PAGE    OF    PATRICK    HENRY  S    FAMILY    1UHLE 


RED  HILL 

morrow."  And  this  he  would  never  neglect.  Henry's 
fondness  for  the  Bible  grew  with  his  years.  "  This 
book,"  said  he  to  a  neighbor,  "  is  worth  all  the  books 
that  ever  were  printed,  and  it  has  been  my  misfortune 
that  I  never  found  time  to  read  it  with  the  proper 
attention  and  feeling  till  lately.  I  trust  in  the  mercy 
of  Heaven  that  it  is  not  yet  too  late." 

Henry's  Bible  readings  must  have  had  a  great  many 
interruptions,  if  this  account  of  his  life,  from  "  Homes 
of  American  Statesmen,"  be  exact — and  we  have  no 
reason  to  doubt  it: 

"  His  house  was  usually  filled  with  friends,  its  dependencies 
with  their  retinue  and  horses.  But  crowds,  besides,  came  and 
went ;  all  were  received  and  entertained  with  cordiality.  .  .  . 
All  took  his  counsel  as  if  it  had  been  an  oracle.  .  .  .  Those 
who  lived  near  always  came  to  breakfast,  where  all  were 
welcomed  and  made  full.  The  larder  never  seemed  to  get 
lean.  Breakfast  over,  creature  comforts,  such  as  might  console 
the  belated  for  its  loss,  were  presently  set  forth  on  side- 
tables  in  the  wide  entrance-hall.  Of  these — the  solid,  not  the 
liquid  parts  of  a  rural  morning's  meal — breakfast  without  its 
slops,  and  such  as,  if  need  were,  might  well  sta  for  a 
dinner,  all  further  comers  helped  themselves  as  the  day  or 
their  appetites  advanced.  Meanwhile,  the  master  saw  and 
welcomed  all  'with  the  kindliest  attention,  asked  of  their 
household,  listened  to  their  affairs,  gave  them  his  view,  con 
tented  all.  These  audiences  seldom  ceased  before  noon,  or 
the  early  dinner.  To  this  a  remaining  party  of  from  twenty  to 
thirty  often  sat  down.  It  was  always,  according  to  the  wont 
of  such  houses  in  that  well-fed  land,  a  meal  beneath  which 
the  tables  groaned,  and  whose  massive  Saxon  dishes  would 
have  made  a  Frenchman  sweat.  Everything  is  excellent  at 
these  lavish  feasts:  but  they  have  no  luxuries  save  such  as 
are  home-grown.  They  are,  however,  all  that  is  substantial  and 
plain,  the  very  summit  of  good  cheer.  At  Governor  Henry's, 
they  never  failed  to  be,  besides,  seasoned  with  his  conversation, 
which  at  table  always  grew  gay  and  even  gamesome.  The 
dinner  ended,  he  betook  himself  to  his  studies  until  supper, 
after  which  he  again  gave  himself  up  to  enjoyment.  In  this 
manner  came,  with  the  kindliest  and  most  cheerful  approach, 
the  close  of  his  days." 

403 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

"He  was  very  abstemious  u^his  diet,"  says  Patrick 
Henry  Fontaine,  "  and  used  no  wine  or  alcoholic  stim 
ulants.  Distressed  and  alarmed  at  the  increase  of 
drunkenness  after  the  Revolutionary  War,  he  did  every 
thing  in  his  power  to  arrest  the  vice.  He  thought  that 
the  introduction  of  a  harmless  beverage,  as  a  substi 
tute  for  distilled  spirits,  would  be  beneficial.  To  effect 
this  object,  he  ordered  from  his  merchant  in  Scotland 
a  consignment  of  barley,  and  a  Scotch  brewer  and  his 
wife  to  cultivate  the  grain  and  make  small  beer.  To 
render  the  beverage  fashionable  and  popular,  he  always 
had  it  upon  his  table  while  he  was  Governor  during  his 
last  term  of  office ;  and  he  continued  its  use,  but  drank 
nothing  stronger,  while  he  lived.  ...  In  his  old 
age,  the  condition  of  his  nervous  system  made  the  scent 
of  a  tobacco-pipe  very  disagreeable  to  him.  The  old 
colored  house-servants  were  compelled  to  hide  their 
pipes,  and  rid  themselves  of  the  scent  of  tobacco, 
before  they  ventured  to  approach  him.  They  protested 
that  they  had  not  smoked,  or  seen  a  pipe ;  and  he  inva 
riably  proved  the  culprit  guilty  by  following  the  scent, 
and  leading  them  to  the  corn-cob  pipes  hid  in  some 
crack  or  cranny,  which  he  made  them  take  and  throw 
instantly  into  the  kitchen  fire,  without  reforming  their 
habits,  or  correcting  the  evil,  which  is  likely  to  continue 
as  long  as  tobacco  will  grow." 

Still  telling  of  Henry  and  the  men  who  saw  to  it 
that  the  larder  never  got  lean,  Fontaine  continues : 

"  His  residence  overlooked  a  large  field  in  the  bottom  of 
Staunton  River,  the  most  of  which  could  be  seen  from  his 
yard.  He  rose  early ;  and  in  the  mornings  of  the  spring,  sum 
mer,  and  fall,  before  sunrise,  while  the  air  was  cool  and 
calm,  reflecting  clearly  and  distinctly  the  sounds  of  the  lowing 
herds  and  singing  birds,  he  stood  upon  an  eminence,  and  gave 
orders  and  directions  to  his  servants  at  work  a  half-mile  distant 
from  him.  The  strong,  musical  voices  of  the  negroes  responded 
to  him.  During  this  elocutionary  morning  exercise,  his  enuncia- 

404 


RKD  HILL 

tion  was  clear  and  distinc  enough  to  be  heard  over  an  area 
which  ten  thousand  people  could  not  have  filled ;  and  the  tones 
of  his  voice  were  as  melodious  as  an  Alpine  horn." 

Thus  a  grandson,  painting  for  us  a  morning  picture ; 
now  a  great-granddaughter,  presenting  us  with  a  softer 
evening  picture — fit  little  pendant  for  the  larger  first. 
Elizabeth  Henry  Lyons  says : 

"  Towards  the  close  of  day,  in  summer-time,  he  took  the 
breeze  on  the  lawn.  Around  him  played  his  children,  to 
whom  he  was  greatly  attached,  and  whom  he  treated  as  com 
panions  and  friends.  He  was  very  fond  of  music,  and  often 
times  the  sweet  notes  of  his  flute  or  violin,  echoing  on  the 
evening  air,  broke  the  stillness  of  the  valley." 

Some  of  the  Henry  servants  had  Indian  blood.  In 
the  great  meadow  near  Red  Hill  house  one  can  trace 
the  site  of  an  ancient  town.  All  other  parts  of  the 
meadow  may  be  flooded,  but  this  space  remains  high 
and  dry.  "  Beautifully  cut  arrow-heads,  stone  hatchets, 
and  pottery  with  crude  marks  of  decoration,"  says  Mrs. 
Lyons,  "  may  yet  be  found  on  the  once  happy  hunting- 
grounds  of  a  banished  race.  One  of  these  aborigines, 
'  Indian  Jim/  intermarried  with  a  slave  woman,  and 
her  grandson,  Harrison,  was  living  until  a  few  months 
ago  in  a  cabin  on  the  hillside,  near  the  family  mansion. 
He  had  the  high  cheek-bones  and  copper  skin  of  his 
grandfather,  but  in  other  respects  he  was  a  typical 
body-servant  of  an  old  and  almost  forgotten  regime. 
He  was  trained  in  the  house  by  the  widow  of  Patrick 
Henry." 

"  Fox-a-laddie,"  "Scotchman,"  "Uncle  Big  Solo 
mon,"  and  "Jack  White"  were  the  locally  famous  Henry 
blacks  of  whom  tradition  tells  in  connection  with  their 
master.  They  knew  that  Red  Hill  was  bottomed  on 
flint  rock,  because  they  had  dug  down  into  it,  and  they 
verily  believed  that  Patrick  Henry  was  the  greatest 

405 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

man  this  side  Bible  times,  because  he  was  a  prophet. 
One  of  them  overheard  him  say :  "  Ah,  after  my  head 
is  covered  up  in  clay,  you  will  see  what  will  come  of 
it ;  "  and  he  was  so  impressed  with  the  phrase  that  he 
treasured  it,  and  passed  it  down  to  his  children.  Henry, 
to  his  Bible-loving  blacks,  was  a  new  "  John  in  the 
island  of  Pa'tmos " — powerful  to  foretell.  "  Jack 
White,"  who  was  half  Indian,  and  "  Uncle  Big  Solo 
mon  "  were  with  "  the  Governor  "  a  great  deal  on  his 
various  journeys.  How  this  Solomon  bore  "  Marse 
Patrick  "  on  his  broad  shoulders  across  Staunton  River 
and  set  him  down  in  Halifax  without  a  wetting  is  still 
talked  of  among  the  numerous  Henry  negroes  in  the 
Red  Hill  neighborhood.  Never  did  they  laugh  so  much, 
it  is  said,  as  at  "  Uncle  Big  Solomon's  "  struggle  with 
the  rapid  red  current  of  the  swelling  river.  Imagine 
the  old  orator  thus  perched  upon  the  black  man's  back, 
and  we  have  a  good  picture  of  the  life  at  Red  Hill. 

From  time  to  time  attempts  were  made  to  induce 
Henry  to  reenter  public  life.  It  was  the  Federalist 
period — a  period  of  strife,  of  bitterness,  of  danger. 
Henry  philosophically  held  himself  aloof  from  the 
struggle  as  long  as  he  could;  but  he  was  too  conscien 
tious  to  remain  entirely  neutral,  and  too  spirited  to 
linger  in  downright  inactivity.  At  last,  in  an  emergent 
crisis,  he  was  drawn  from  his  Red  Hill  seclusion  to  the 
public  stump  at  Charlotte  Court-house;  and  thereby 
hangs  a  tale  which  would  be  long  and  complicated  if 
told  in  its  minutiae,  but  which  may  be  made  short  and 
straightforward  here. 

Now,  if  we  have  it  in  mind  that  a  Federalist  of  1798 
was  identical  with  a  Federalist  of  1788,  let  us  disabuse 
ourselves  of  the  misleading  idea.  If  we  think  that  the 
Anti-Federalists  who  fought  the  Constitution  in  the 
late  eighties  were  identical  with  the  Republicans  (really 
Democrats)  of  the  late  nineties,  let  us  also  dismiss  that 

406 


ENTRY    IN   FAMILY    BIBLE— PATRICK    HENRY'S    HANDWRITING 
(The  interlineations  were  made  by  other  members  of  the  family  after  Henry's  death.) 


RED  HILL 

superficial  and  deceptive  notion.  Great  changes  had 
come.  Mason  was  dead.  Richard  Henry  Lee  was 
dead.  The  issue  they  had  contended  for  was  not  dead, 
but  in  Henry's  estimation  it  was  no  longer  debatable. 
They  had  battled  hard  against  consolidated  government. 
They  had  lost.  They  had  used  every  legitimate  strata 
gem  to  secure  amendments.  They  had  gained  half 
of  their  desire.  And  so  matters  rested.  The  new 
government  was  an  accomplished  fact.  In  Washington's 
view,  it  was  necessary  to  have  a  secure  government, 
based  on  the  Constitution  and  common-sense ;  in  Ham 
ilton's,  a  strong  government,  conducted  by  experts, 
and  in  essentials  unfettered  by  democracy ;  in  Jefferson's, 
a  popular  government,  managed  with  an  eye  to  the  sov 
ereign  attributes  of  the  people  and  to  the  rights  of  the 
States.  The  line  of  party  cleavage  was  between  the 
ground  taken  by  Hamilton  and  the  ground  upon  which 
the  greatest  politician  of  his  age  now  planted  the  stand 
ard  of  the  people.  Meantime,  portentous  storms  arose. 
War  with  England  seemed  imminent.  War  with  France 
appeared  to  be  in  swift  affluxion,  bearing  hither,  on 
destruction  bent,  the  same  ships  that  had  saved  us. 
The  un-American  Alien  Act  angered  multitudes.  The 
despotic  Sedition  Act  was  equally  inflammatory  of  the 
public  mind.  Then,  in  answer  to  these  acts,  came  the 
nullification  threat  in  the  Kentucky  Resolutions,  drawn 
by  Jefferson,  and  the  veiled  threat  in  the  somewhat 
milder  Virginia  Resolutions,  drawn  by  Madison.  A 
break-up  was  impending;  and  Washington,  troubled  in 
his  heart,  feared  anarchy. 

Henry  all  this  time  supported  the  Federal  Govern 
ment.  Having  with  his  own  eyes  beheld  Virginia  take 
up  the  pen  that  wrote  away  certain  of  her  own  powers, 
and  with  that  pen  subscribe  to  the  nationalization  of  the 
United  States,  he  knew  exactly  where  his  allegiance 
belonged.  Strange  to  say,  Madison,  who  had  fought 

407 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

for  strong  government  in  1788,  was  the  State  Rights 
advocate  of  1798.  He  had  swung  about,  parting  with 
Hamilton  at  the  time  of  the  Assumption  Act,  and  there 
after  permitting  Jefferson  to  dominate  him.  Not  so 
with  Henry.  Jefferson  tried  in  vain  to  win  Henry, 
and  afterwards  spoke  of  him  abusively;  but,  as  we 
have  said,  the  times  were  bitter,  and,  as  we  have  further 
said,  Jefferson's  obliquity  of  estimate  in  his  old  age  was 
notorious.  See,  now,  the  way  of  it.  One  great  man  is 
dead,  and  another  talks  about  him.  What  the  living 
great  man  says  finds  credence — is  gospel  truth  with 
many,  because  those  who  listen  look  up  to  him.  The 
living  great  man  knows  that  his  words  will  be  repeated 
and  sent  about  the  country,  or  put  into  a  book  and 
copied  into  other  books.  He  gains  assurance  from  the 
knowledge  that  even  though  he  assert  positively  things 
which  some  disbelieve,  the  weight  of  his  word  will 
carry  it  over  and  beyond  their  denials.  He  knows, 
also,  that  the  subject  of  his  slighting  remarks  cannot 
refute  him.  It  is  safe  for  a  living  great  man  to  dis 
parage  the  great  man  who  is  dead  and,  for  the  time 
being,  out  of  favor  with  fame.  But  we  shall  not  set 
ourselves  up  as  censors  of  Jefferson,  whose  services 
to  his  country  were  of  vast  import.  He  becomes  a  hero 
with  us  when  we  are  school-children,  because  it  was 
he  who  wrote  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  and  be 
cause  we  are  taught  that  in  so  writing  he  wrote  himself 
into  the  book  of  the  founders.  At  all  times  through 
life  we  are  prepared  to  scorn  those  who  speak  lightly  of 
the  Declaration,  and  when  we  die,  it  is  with  as  much 
love  for  it  as  when  we  first  understood  what  it  meant. 
As  the  founder  of  an  historic  party,  too,  Jefferson  is  a 
commanding  figure.  Few  characters  are  more  inter 
esting — few  men  have  played  so  useful  a  part.  As 
Professor  Bassett  points  out,  his  very  defects  served 
to  make  him  an  adaptable  coordinating  force.  Yet, 

408 


RED  HILL 

averse  as  we  are  to  controversy  here,  no  one  can  tell 
the  story  of  the  old  patriot,  Patrick  Henry,  without 
putting  a  white  light  on  these  defects.  "  It  is  provok 
ing,  and  it  is  astonishing,  and  it  is  humiliating,"  says 
John  Adams,  "  to  see  how  calumny  sticks  and  is  trans 
mitted  from  age  to  age."  Adams,  himself  a  target  for 
feathered  darts  of  truth  as  well  as  of  malicious  ones, 
knew  whereof  he  spoke. 

Let  us  remember  to  whom  Jefferson  attributed  the 
inquiry  into  his  conduct  as  Governor,  and  that  the  inci 
dent  was  never  forgotten.  It  cut  too  deep.  Jefferson, 
who  became  bankrupt,  found  it  hard  to  forgive  Henry 
for  the  crime  of  getting  rich.  Jeffersonian  ideas  pre 
vailed  in  Virginia  years  after  Henry's  death,  and  the 
Jeffersonian  tincture  and  bias  influenced  many  matters 
connected  with  Henry's  memory.* 

Here  is  an  example  of  the  way  Jefferson  referred  to 
Henry.  The  letter,  dated  July  10,  1796,  is  to  Monroe: 

"  Most  assiduous  court  is  paid  to  Patrick  Henry.  He  has 
been  offered  everything  which  they  knew  he  would  not  accept. 
Some  impression  is  thought  to  be  made  on  him,  but  we  do  not 
believe  it  is  radical.  If  they  thought  they  could  count  on  him, 
they  would  run  him  for  their  Vice-President,  their  firm  object 
being  to  produce  a  schism  in  this  State." 

Later  in  life,  Jefferson  wrote: 

"  General  Washington  flattered  him  by  an  appointment  to 
a  mission  to  Spain,  which  he  declined,  and  by  proposing  to 

*  Jefferson's  overshadowing  influence  at  the  beginning  of  the 
Nineteenth  Century  is  well  shown  by  the  Legislature's  course 
in  the  matter  of  a  Henry  memorial.  A  resolution  providing 
for  a  marble  bust  of  Henry,  to  be  placed  in  the  hall  of  the 
House,  was  actually  tabled ;  and  year  after  year  went  by  with 
out  proper  recognition  of  "his  services.  It  is  to  Wirt's  lasting 
credit  that  he  looked  beneath  the  surface,  and  resolved  to  erect 
a  monument  of  greater  value  than  a  marble  bu^st  could  be.  x 

409 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

him  the  office  of  Secretary  of  State,  on  the  most  earnest 
solicitation  of  General  Henry  Lee,  who  pledged  himself  that 
Henry  would  not  accept  it ;  for  General  Washington  knew  that 
lie  was  entirely  unqualified  for  it,  and  moreover  that  his  self- 
esteem  had  never  suffered  him  to  act  as  second  to  any  man  on 
earth." 

Here  we  see  two  men  placed  in  a  bad  light.  Wash 
ington  is  shown  as  an  insincere  soul — a  double-dealer. 
Who  believes  it  ?  Jefferson  put  it  on  record  in  his  own 
hand  that  Washington  was  in  his  dotage.  Who  believes 
that?  Jefferson  wrote  a  private  letter  to  his  friend 
Philip  Mazzei,  in  Florence,  and  mischief  arose  when  it 
got  into  print ;  for  it  abused  Washington  and  his  whole 
following.  "  It  would  give  you  a  fever,"  wrote  Jeffer 
son,  "  were  I  to  name  to  you  the  apostates  who  have 
gone  over  to  these  heresies,  men  who  were  Samsons  in 
the  field  and  Solomons  in  the  council,  but  who  have  had 
their  heads  shorn  by  the  harlot  England."  No  wonder 
Washington  was  deeply  hurt — almost  put  out  of  heart 
with  humankind,  for  he  had  but  lately  received  a  letter 
from  Jefferson  professing  fidelity. 

In  speaking  of  Henry  as  an  "  apostate,"  it  may  be 
that  Jefferson  did  not  consider  the  word  he  used  abusive. 
From  the  very  start,  the  language  of  American  politics 
has  been  ridiculously  violent.  The  man  in  opposition 
has  always  been  an  "  ingrate,"  and  vice  .versa ;  and,  as 
each  of  us  is  in  opposition  to  some  one  else,  it  follows 
that  we  are  all  "  ingrates."  Jefferson  himself  was  sub 
jected  to  such  terrific  vilification  that  "  apostate  "  may 
have  seemed  to  him  to  be  milky  in  its  mildness.  What  he 
probably  meant  with  respect  to  Henry  was  that,  to  be 
consistent,  Henry  should  have  stood  by  the  State  Rights 
men.  But  Henry's  position  was  logical.  Fundament 
ally  he  had  not  changed.  The  times  had.  He  had  fa 
vored  a  stronger  general  government  until  alarmed  by 
the  threat  to  close  the  Mississippi.  Then  he  had  feared 

410 


RED  HILL 

it,  and  opposed  it  with  all  his  might.  He  had  said  over 
and  over  again,  out  of  his  heart  and  with  all  the  vehe 
mence  of  his  intense  nature,  that  the  new  government 
was  a  consolidated  affair,  a  nation.  Would  he  not  have 
belied  himself  now  if  he  had  joined  Jefferson  and 
declared  that  the  new  government  was  not  a  consolidated 
affair,  but  a  compact  between  sovereign  States?  The 
fact  is  that  he  had  reverted  to  the  ground  occupied  by 
him  before  he  had  become  alarmed  at  the  spectre  of 
despotism.  Mason,  Lee,  Henry,  thousands  of  Liberty 
men,  had  qualms  about  despots.  Madison  was  actually 
inconsistent,  but  Henry  only  seemed  to  be  so.  He  must 
have  realized,  about  the  time  of  his  retirement,  that  one- 
man  power  was  not  to  be  feared,  after  all — that  he  had 
magnified  the  matter.  He  watched  the  progress  of 
affairs,  and  became  interested  in  the  success  of  the  new 
government.  Washington's  neutrality  policy  with  regard 
to  France  pleased  him  greatly.  He  had  a  deep  dread 
and  horror  of  infidelity,  and  it  saddened  him  to  think 
that  so  many  republicans  in  America  sympathized  with 
those  of  the  red  breed  abroad.  Jefferson  courted  the 
Reds ;  Henry  shrank  from  them.  This  feeling  alone 
was  enough  to  prevent  him  from  joining  hands  with 
Jefferson.  No  doubt  the  conservatism  which  comes 
with  age  influenced  Henry  in  some  degree.  We  are  not 
to  forget  that  he  was  a  rebel  by  nature.  But  your 
fiercest  propagandist  is  tamed  by  time.  By  this  we  do 
not  mean  that  Henry  lost  his  republicanism — not  at  all. 
But  there  was  a  tinge  of  philosophy  in  his  later  view. 
We  should. not  wonder  if  he  were  a  bit  weary.  At  first 
he  had  welcomed  the  French  Revolution.  But  in  1798 
he  said  to  a  company  which  was  discussing  the  news 
that  Bonaparte  had  annihilated  five  Austrian  armies: 

"  It   won't    do !      The   present    generation    in    France    is    so 
debased  by  a  long  despotism,  they  possess  so  few  of  the  virtues 

411 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

that  constitute  the  life  and  soul  of  republicanism,  that  they  are 
incapable  of  forming  a  correct  and  just  estimate  of -rational 
liberty.  Their  revolution  will  terminate  differently  from  what 
you  expect — their  state  of  anarchy  will  be  succeeded  by  despot 
ism,  and  I  should  not  be  surprised  if  the  very  man  at  whose 
victories  you  now  rejoice  should,  Caesar-like,  subvert  the 
liberties  of  his  country.  All  who  know  me  know  that  I  am 
a  firm  advocate  for  liberty  and  republicanism.  I  believe  I 
have  given  some  evidence  of  this.  I  wish  it  may  not  be  so, 
but  I  fear  the  event  will  justify  the  prediction." 

Obviously,  Henry's  patriotic  attitude  towards  the 
troubled  young  government  of  the  United  States  was 
a  power  for  good  in  Virginia.  Many  of  his  friends 
were  his  followers  till  death.  Other  adherents  of  for 
mer  days  were  puzzled  by  his  course,  and  some  censured 
him.  They  could  not  participate  in  the  magnanimity 
of  the  man  who,  having  taken  off  his  hat  to  the  new 
government — the  supreme  law  of  the  land — proceeded 
to  obey  it,  in  the  spirit  and  in  the  letter.  Writing  from 
Red  Hill,  August  20,  1796,  to  "  My  dear  Betsy  "  (Mrs. 
Aylett),  Henry  said: 

"  As  to  the  reports  you  have  heard  of  my  changing  sides 
in  politics,  I  can  only  say  that  they  are  not  true.  I  am  too  old 
to  exchange  my  former  opinions,  which  have  grown  up  into 
fixed  habits  of  thinking.  True  it  is,  I  have  condemned  the 
conduct  of  our  members  in  Congress,  because,  in  refusing  to 
raise  money  for  the  purposes  of  the  British  treaty,  they  in 
effect  would  have  surrendered  our  country,  bound  hand  and 
foot,  to  the  power  of  the  British  nation.  This  must  have  been 
the  consequence,  I  think ;  but  the  reasons  for  thinking  so 
are  too  tedious  to  trouble  you  with.  The  treaty  is,  in  my 
opinion,  a  very  bad  one  indeed.  But  what  must  I  think  of 
those  men  whom  I  myself  warned  of  the  danger  of  giving  the 
power  of  making  the  laws,  by  means  of  treaty,  to  the  President 
and  Senate — when  I  see  these  same  men  denying  the  existence 
of  that  power  which  they  insisted,  in  our  Convention,  ought 
properly  to  be  exercised  by  the  President  and  Senate,  and  by 
none  other?  The  policy  of  these  men,  both  then  and  now, 
appears  to  me  quite  void  of  wisdom  and  foresight.  These  senti- 

412 


RED  HILL 

ments  I  did  mention  in  conversation  in  Richmond.  ...  It 
seems  that  every  word  was  watched  which  I  casually  dropped, 
and  wrested  to  answer  party  views.  Who  can  have  been 
so  meanly  employed,  I  know  not — nor  do  I  care ;  for  I  no 
longer  consider  myself  an  actor  on  the  stage  of  public  life. 
It  is  time  for  me  to  retire ;  and  I  shall  never  more  appear 
in  public  character,  unless  some  unlooked-for  circumstance 
shall  demand  from  me  a  transient  effort  not  inconsistent  with 
private  life — in  which  I  have  determined  to  continue.  I  see 
with  concern  our  old  Commander-in-Chief  most  abusively 
treated — nor  are  his  long  and  great  services  remembered  as 
any  apology  for  his  mistakes  in  an  office  to  which  he  was  totally 
unaccustomed.  If  he,  whose  character  as  our  leader  during 
the  whole  war  was  above  all  praise,  is  so  roughly  handled  in 
his  old  age,  what  may  be  expected  by  men  of  the  common 
standard  of  character?  .  .  .  The  view  which  the  rising 
greatness  of  our  country  presents  to  my  eye  is  greatly  tarnished 
by  the  general  prevalence  of  deism,  which,  with  me,  is  but 
another  name  for  vice  and  depravity.  .  .  .  May  God  bless 
you,  my  dear  Betsy,  and  your  children." 

Next  in  value  to  Henry's  own  testimony  with  respect 
to  his  political  beliefs  is  that  of  Judge  John  Tyler,  who 
wrote  of  him : 

"  The  close  of  his  life  was  clouded  in  the  opinion  of  many  of 
his  friends,  supposing  he  was  attached  to  the  aristocratic 
[Federalist]  party;  but  however  he  might  have  been  misled  in 
founding  his  opinions  by  misrepresentations  in  his  aged  and 
infirm  state,  it  was  impossible  he  could  be  an  aristocrat.  His 
principles  were  too  well  fixed.  ...  I  lament  that  I  could 
not  see  him  before  his  death ;  he  sent  me  a  message  expressing 
his  desire  to  satisfy  me  how  much  he  had  been  misrepresented. 
'  Men  might  differ  in  ways  and  means,  and  not  in  principles/ 
said  he." 

Tyler  was  so  robust  a  character,  so  clear-headed  a 
man,  so  capable,  so  sincerely  a  democrat,  and  withal 
so  outspoken,  that  his  judgment  concerning  the  catho 
licity  of  Henry's  republicanism  offsets  and  cancels  all 
that  need  be  cleared  away  in  the  matter  of  unjustifiable 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

criticism.  The  testimony,  it  is  observed,  relates  to 
Henry's  last  days.  Judge  Roane  intimates  that  Henry's 
health  was  so  undermined  in  1797  and  1798  as  to  lay 
him  open  to  the  approach  of  manipulating  politicians, 
and  this  weakness,  this  unwonted  pliancy,  this  mellow 
ing  towards  a  world  he  was  soon  to  leave,  may  have 
been  apparent  to  those  who  walked  with  him  under 
the  locusts  at  Red  Hill ;  but  no  weakness  shows  either 
in  his  acts  or  in  his  correspondence.  In  fine,  whenever 
the  Patrick  Henry  of  the  'go's  took  issue  with  the 
Patrick  Henry  of  the  '8o's,  it  was  with  a  patriotic  as 
distinguished  from  a  partisan  motive,  and  for  a  cause 
in  no  way  conflicting  with  his  settled  principles  as  a 
champion  of  liberty  in  the  new  world. 

Certainly,  ambition,  so  strong  with  old  men  who 
have  tasted  battle,  had  nothing  to  do  with  his  course. 
One  has  but  to  go  over  a  list  of  the  high  places  offered 
him,  to  appreciate  the  truth  of  this : 

In  1794  he  was  tendered  a  United  States  Senatorship 
by  General  Henry  Lee,  then  Governor  of  Virginia. 

In  the  same  year  President  Washington  proposed 
to  send  him  as  Minister  to  Spain. 

In  1795  Washington  wished  to  make  him  Secretary 
of  State. 

In  1796  Washington  proffered  him  the  Chief- Justice 
ship  of  the  United  States  Supreme  Court. 

In  the  same  year  Washington  designed  to  send  him 
as  Minister  to  France. 

Talked  of  as  a  candidate  for  the  Vice-Presidency, 
he  declined  proffered  votes  in  the  Electoral  College  for 
the  Presidency  itself. 

For  the  sixth  time  he  was  elected  Governor  of  Vir 
ginia. 

In  1799  President  Adams  named  him  as  Envoy  to 
France,  and  the  Senate  confirmed  the  nomination. 

All  these  places  and  honors  were  declined  by  Henry. 
414 


RED  HILL 

He  knew  his  power,  but  preferred  not  to  exercise  it 
except  on  rare  occasions.  He  helped  to  elect  General 
Lee  to  Congress,  and  wrote  a  memorable  letter  that  is 
thought  to  have  sent  John  Marshall  thither.  This  letter 
was  dated  January  8,  1799,  and,  as  William  Wirt 
Henry  reminds  us,  furnishes  "  a  complete  answer  to 
the  taunt  that  his  mental  faculties  were  fallen  into 
decay."  Mellowed  into  kindness  they  may  have  been, 
but  his  head  was  as  clear  as  a  bell.  Marshall's  contest 
was  with  John  Clopton,  and  the  letter  was  in  answer  to 
one  from  Archibald  Blair,  who  knew  that  a  good  word 
from  Henry  would  go  a  long  way  in  the  Hanover  dis 
trict.  In  the  course  of  his  letter,  Henry  referred  to  the 
trouble  with  France,  whence  Marshall  had  lately  re 
turned.  He  wrote: 

"  Her  conduct  has  made  it  the  interest  of  the  great  family  of 
mankind  to  wish  the  downfall  of  her  present  government, 
because  its  existence  is  incompatible  with  that  of  all  others 
within  its  reach.  And  whilst  I  see  the  dangers  that  threaten 
ours  from  her  intrigues  and  her  arms,  I  am  not  so  much 
alarmed  as  at  the  apprehension  of  her  destroying  the  great 
pillars  of  all  government  and  of  social  life ;  I  mean  virtue, 
morality,  and  religion.  This  is  the  armor,  my  friend,  and  this 
alone,  that  renders  us  invincible.  These  are  the  tactics  we  should 
study.  If  we  lose  these,  we  are  conquered,  fallen  indeed. 
In  vain  may  France  show  and  vaunt  her  diplomatic  skill  and 
brave  troops ;  so  long  as  our  manners  and  principles  remain 
sound,  there  is  no  danger.  But  ...  I  feel  the  value  of 
those  men  amongst  us  who  hold  out  to  the  world  the  idea 
that  our  continent  is  to  exhibit  an  originality  of  character; 
and  that  instead  of  that  imitation  and  inferiority  which  the 
countries  of  the  old  world  have  been  in  the  habit  of  exacting 
from  the  new,  we  shall  maintain  the  high  ground  upon  which 
nature  has  placed  us,  and  that  Europe  will  alike  cease  to  rule 
us  and  give  us  modes  of  thinking.  .  .  .  Tell  Marshall  I 
love  him,  because  he  felt  and  acted  as  a  republican,  as  an 
American.  The  story  of  the  Scotch  merchants  and  old  Tories 
voting  for  him  is  too  stale,  childish,  and  foolish,  and  is  a  French 
finesse;  an  appeal  to  prejudice,  not  reason  and  good  sense. 
...  I  really  should  give  him  my  vote  for  Congress  pref- 

415 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

erably  to  any  citizen  in  the  State  at  this  juncture,  one  only 
excepted,  and  that  one  in  another  line.  ...  I  am  too  old 
and  infirm  ever  again  to  undertake  public  concerns.  I  live 
much  retired,  amidst  a  multiplicity  of  blessings  from  that 
Gracious  Ruler  of  all  things  to  whom  I  owe  unceasing  ac 
knowledgments  for  His  unmerited  goodness  to  me ;  and  if  I 
was  permitted  to  add  to  this  catalogue  one  other  blessing,  it 
would  be  that  my  countrymen  should  learn  wisdom  and  virtue, 
and  in  this  their  day  know  the  things  that  pertain  to  their 
peace." 

In  all  probability,  this  eloquent  letter  served  a  great 
purpose.  But  for  it,  Marshall,  whose  majority  was  only 
1 08,  would  not  have  been  upon  the  floor  of  the  House  to 
defend  President  Adams ;  but  for  his  powerful  defence, 
Adams  would  not  have  made  him  Secretary  of  State 
and  Chief-Justice ;  but  for  his  work  as  Chief- Justice 
during  thirty-four  years,  much  that  was  amiss  would 
have  lacked  amendment. 

Let  us  confess  that  thus  far,  in  this  account  of  Henry's 
last  days,  we  have  purposely  withheld  certain  parts  of 
the  story  that  refer  to  Washington.  The  personal  rela 
tions  between  the  two  ceased  to  be  cordial  at  the  time 
of  the  contest  over  the  Federal  Constitution.  Exag 
gerated  sayings  attributed  to  one  were  reported  to  the 
other.  False  tales  were  borne.  Henry  was  led  to  be 
lieve  that  his  former  friend  now  looked  upon  him  with 
coldness,  if  not  in  enmity.  In  1791  Washington  made 
a  carriage-tour  of  eighteen  hundred  miles  through  the 
South,  and  on  his  return  stopped  in  Prince  Edward. 
He  did  not  see  Henry,  but  talked  with  men  who  subse 
quently  buzzed  in  Henry's  ear.  A  tale-bearer  with  a 
political  purpose  falsely  reported  that  Washington  had 
spoken  of  Henry  as  "  a  factious,  seditious  character." 
Henry,  of  course,  was  grieved.  Men  who  wished  to 
keep  them  apart  forged  some  letters  in  which  Washing 
ton  was  made  to  abuse  Henry.  Washington  discovered 
the  forgeries,  and  was  at  pains  to  put  his  repudiation 

416 


RED  HILL 

of  them  on  record;  but,  for  the  time  being,  they  had 
a  mischievous  effect.  It  was  not  in  Henry's  nature  to 
harbor  ill  feeling  against  any  man  of  decency,  much  less 
against  a  man  whom  he  admired  above  all  others.  David 
Meade  Randolph  says : 

"The  purity  of  Mr.  Henry's  republicanism  was  shown 
when  dining  with  his  brother,  Colonel  John  Syme,  at  Rocky 
Mills,  during  a  May  session  of  the  Circuit  Court,  held  by 
Judge  Iredell  at  Richmond.  The  company  was  composed  of 
very  respectable  characters  of  both  parties.  '  The  people/  as 
the  first  toast  upon  removing,  the  cloth,  was  announced  very 
audibly  by  the  host.  Mr.  Henry,  pushing  his  old  black  wig 
aside,  as  was  his  custom  when  much  excited,  and  with  his 
elbows  akimbo,  exclaimed :  '  What,  brother !  Not  drink  to 
General  Washington,  as  we  used  to?  For  shame,  brother! 
for  shame ! '  and  filling  up  his  glass  with  a  bumper  of  Thom 
son's  Madeira,  announced  the  name  of  Washington." 

We  know,  too,  how  Washington  felt  towards  Henry. 
In  forwarding  to  Mount  Vernon  a  copy  of  Henry's 
letter  in  behalf  of  Marshall's  candidacy,  Blair  wrote: 
"  With  regard  to  you,  sir,  I  may  say,  as  he  said  of 
Marshall,  that  he  loved  you,  and  for  the  same  reason — 
because  you  felt  and  acted  as  a  republican,  as  an  Ameri 
can;  for  I  have  no  doubt  but  he  alluded  to  you  when 
he  makes  the  exception,  '  one  other,  who  was  in  another 
line,'  to  whom  he  would  give  the  preference."  Wash 
ington,  in  his  reply,  said :  "  My  breast  never  harbored 
a  suspicion  that  Mr.  Henry  was  unfriendly  to  me; 
although  I  had  reason  to  believe  that  the  same  spirit 
which  was  at  work  to  destroy  all  confidence  in  the  public 
functionaries  was  not  less  busy  in  poisoning  private 
fountains  and  sowing  the  seeds  of  distrust  among  men 
of  the  same  political  sentiments." 

But  it  is  likely  that  Washington  and  Henry  would 
have  gone  to  their  graves  without  a  renewal  of  their 
friendship,  had  it  not  occurred  to  General  Lee  to  bring 

27  417 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

them  together.  It  was  in  sounding  Henry  on  the  Chief- 
Justiceship  that  this  quick-witted  mediator  learned  of  the 
wound  in  Henry's  breast  because  of  the  reported  remark 
at  Prince  Edward.  Away,  then,  went  Lee,  and  speedily 
wrote  to  Washington,  who,  in  his  reply,  made  it  clear 
that  he  had  never  used  the  words  attributed  to  him. 
He  said :  "  A  part  of  the  plan  for  creating  discord  is, 
I  perceive,  to  make  me  say  things  of  others,  and  others 
of  me,  which  have  no  foundation  in  truth."  Lee's  good 
offices  were  used  with  such  delicacy  that  in  a  little  while 
the  two  friends,  long  apart,  were  reunited. 

In  a  letter  marked  "  confidential,"  which  is  dated 
Mount  Vernon,  January  15,  1799,  Washington  wrote 
to  Henry: 

"  It  would  be  a  waste  of  time  to  bring  to  the  view  of  a 
person  of  your  observation  and  discernment  the  endeavors  of 
a  certain  party  among  us  to  disquiet  the  public  mind  with  un 
founded  alarms;  to  arraign  every  act  of  the  administration; 
to  set  the  people  at  variance  with  their  government,  and  to 
embarrass  all  its  measures.  ...  At  such  a  crisis  as  this, 
when  everything  dear  and  valuable  to  us  is  assailed  .  .  . 
when  measures  are  systematically  and  pertinaciously  pursued 
which  must  eventually  dissolve  the  Union,  or  produce  coercion ; 
I  say,  when  these  things  have  become  so  obvious,  ought 
characters  who  are  best  able  to  rescue  their  country  from  the 
pending  evil  to  stay  at  home?  Rather  ought  they  not  to  come 
forward,  and  by  their  talents  and  influence  stand  in  the 
breach  which  such  conduct  has  made  on  the  peace  and 
happiness  of  this  country,  and  oppose  the  widening  of  it? 
...  I  come,  now,  my  good  sir,  to  the  object  of  my  letter, 
which  is  to  express  a  hope  and  an  earnest  wish  that  you  will 
come  forward  at  the  ensuing  elections  (if  not  for  Congress, 
which  you  may  think  would  take  you  too  long  from  home)  as 
a  candidate  for  Representative  in  the  General  Assembly  of  the 
Commonwealth.  .  .  .  Your  weight  of  character  and  influ 
ence  in  the  House  of  Representatives  would  be  a  bulwark 
against  such  dangerous  sentiments  as  are  delivered  there  at 
present.  It  would  be  a  rallying  point  for  the  timid,  and  an 
attraction  of  the  wavering.  In  a  word,  I  conceive  it  to  be  of 
immense  importance  at  this  crisis  that  you  should  be  there ;  and 

418 


RED  HILL 

I  would  fain  hope  that  all  minor  considerations  will  be  made 
to   yield  to   the   measure." 

Such  was  the  appeal  of  one  of  the  fathers  and  found 
ers,  who  was  soon  to  die,  to  another  already  dying. 
Henry  could  not  resist  it.  He  would  do  what  he  could. 
He  was  feeble,  but  he  would  buckle  on  his  armor  once 
more  and  go  down  to  battle.  He  caused  it  to  be  sounded 
abroad  that  he  would  stand  for  the  House.  He  who  had 
put  from  him  certain  high  honors  would  plead  for  a 
higher — he  would  ask  his  neighbors  of  Charlotte  to  make 
him  their  Representative.  He  would  address  them  on 
the  green  at  Charlotte,  on  County  Court  day,  the  first 
Monday  in  March. 

On  the  first  Sunday  in  March  Henry  ventured  forth  in 
his  carriage,  and  was  driven  twenty  miles  "  to  the  house 
of  a  friend,"  that  of  Colonel  Joel  Watkins,  of  "  Wood- 
fork,"  where  he  was  accustomed  to  stop,  and  there  spent 
the  night.  In  the  morning  he  drove  three  miles  to  the 
Court-house,  where  a  concourse  welcomed  him.  Not 
Charlotte  alone,  but  neighboring  counties  contributed 
to  the  throng.  Some  had  never  heard  Henry;  others, 
who  had  heard  him,  wished  to  hear  him  again,  for  it 
was  well  understood  that  this,  perforce,  would  be  his 
parting  speech. 

"  As  soon  as  he  appeared  on  the  ground,"  says  Wirt, 
"  he  was  surrounded  by  the  admiring  and  adoring 
crowd,  and  whithersoever  he  moved,  the  concourse  fol 
lowed  him.  A  preacher  of  the  Baptist  Church,  whose 
piety  was  wounded  by  this  homage  paid  to  a  mortal, 
asked  the  people  aloud :  '  Why  they  followed  Mr.  Henry 
about?  Mr.  Henry,'  said  he,  'is  no  god.'  'No,'  said 
Mr.  Henry,  deeply  affected  by  both  the  scene  and  the 
remark,  '  no,  indeed,  my  friend ;  I  am  but  a  poor  worm 
of  the  dust — as  fleeting  and  Unsubstantial  as  the  shadow 
of  the  cloud  that  flies  over  yonder  fields  and  is  remem- 

419 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

bered  no  more.'  The  tone  with  which  this  was  uttered, 
and  the  look  which  accompanied  it,  affected  every  heart 
and  silenced  every  voice." 

From  this  mention  of  the  cloud-shadows  upon  the 
surrounding  fields  we  understand  just  what  sort  of  a 
day  it  was — a  day  of  glinting  sunshine,  with  wind  aloft. 
We  see  the  whole  scene,  indeed — the  Court-house,  in 
which  the  grand  jury  was  sitting;  the  hive-like  tavern 
fronting  the  green,  with  Henry  on  the  porch,  his  chair 
surrounded  by  old  acquaintances;  the  platform  for  the 
speakers;  the  pack  of  vehicles,  and  the  ever  moving 
throng.  In  this  throng  were  three  candidates  for  Con 
gress — Colonel  Clement  Carrington,  Federalist;  Pow- 
hatan  Boiling,  Republican  ;  and  another.  Boiling,  "  tall, 
proud  in  his  bearing,  and  a  fair  representative  of  the  old 
aristocracy  fast  melting  away,"  was  bantered  about  his 
scarlet  coat.  "  Very  well,  gentlemen,"  said  he,  bristling, 
"  if  my  coat  does  not  suit  you,  I  can  meet  you  in  any 
other  color."  Boiling's  Republican  rival  was  John  Ran 
dolph.  "  A  tall,  slender,  effeminate-looking  youth  was 
he,"  says  Hugh  A.  Garland ;  "  light  hair,  combed  back 
into  a  well  adjusted  queue — pale  countenance,  beardless 
chin,  bright,  quick  hazel  eye,  blue  frock,  buff  small 
clothes,  and  fair-top  boots.  He  was  doubtless  known 
to  many  on  the  court  green  as  the  little  Jack  Randolph 
they  had  frequently  seen  dashing  by  on  wild  horses, 
riding  a  la  mode  Anglaise,  from  Roanoke  to  Bizarre, 
and  back  from  Bizarre  to  Roanoke."  One  can  imagine 
the  remarks  of  the  crowd,  adds  Garland :  "  '  And  is  that 
the  man  who  is  a  candidate  for  Congress  ?  '  '  Is  he 
going  to  speak  against  Old  Pat  ?  '  '  Why,  he's  nothing 
but  a  boy — he's  got  no  beard !'...'  Old  Pat  will 
eat  him  up  bodily !'...'  Mr.  Taylor,'  said  Colonel 
Reid,  the  clerk  of  the  countv,  to  Mr.  Creed  Taylor,  a 
friend  and  neighbor  of  Randolph,  '  don't  you  or  Peter 
Johnson  mean  to  appear  for  that  young  man  to-day  ? ' 

420 


PATRICK  HENRY'S  CHAIR,  IN  WHICH  HE  DIED 


PATRICK    HENRY'S   DESK 


RED  HILL 

'  Never  mind/  replied  Taylor,  '  he  can  take  care  of 
himself.' ' 

But  the  crowd  soon  pressed  towards  the  platform, 
whence  James  Adams  announced :  "  Oyez !  oyez ! 
Colonel  Henry  will  address  the  people  from  this  stand, 
for  the  last  time  and  at  the  risk  of  his  life."  Thereat, 
"  the  grand  jury  burst  through  the  doors,  some  leaped 
from  the  windows  and  came  running  up  with  the  crowd, 
that  they  might  not  miss  a  word  that  fell  from  the  old 
man's  lips." 

Adams  lifted  Henry  to  the  stand,  and,  as  he  did  so, 
Henry  said :  "  Why,  Jimmy,  you  have  made  a  better 
speech  for  me  than  I  can  make  for  myself !  " 

"  Speak  out,  father,"  said  Jimmy,  "  and  let  us  know 
how  it  is." 

Many  professors  and  students  from  Hampden-Sidney 
College  were  present;  and  one  of  the  students,  John 
Miller,  of  South  Carolina,  mounted  upon  the  pedestal 
of  a  pillar,  where  he  stood  within  eight  feet  of  Henry. 
Miller  says: 

"  He  was  very  infirm,  and  seated  in  a  chair  conversing  with 
some  friends  who  were  pouring  in  from  all  the  surrounding 
country  to  hear  him.  At  length  he  arose  with  difficulty,  and 
stood,  somewhat  bowed  with  age  and  weakness.  His  face 
was  almost  colorless.  His  countenance  was  careworn,  and 
when  he  commenced  his  exordium,  his  voice  was  slightly 
cracked  and  tremulous.  But  in  a  few  moments  a  wonderful 
transformation  of  the  whole  man  occurred,  as  he  warmed 
with  his  theme.  He  stood  erect ;  his  eyes  beamed  with  a  light 
that  was  almost  supernatural;  his  features  glowed  with  the 
hue  and  fire  of  youth ;  and  his  voice  rang  clear  and  melodious, 
with  the  intonations  of  some  grand  musical  instrument  whose 
notes  filled  the  area,  and  fell  distinctly  and  delightfully  upon 
the  ears  of  the  most  distant  of  the  thousands  gathered  before 
him." 

No  short-hand  report  was  made  of  the  speech,  but, 
according  to  an  account  in  John  Randolph's  handwrit- 

421 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

ing,  and  according  to  the  testimony  of  scores  of  good 
listeners,  such  as  Dr.  Archibald  Alexander,  Dr.  John 
H.  Rice,  and  the  Rev.  John  Robinson,  it  ran  as  follows : 

"  He  told  the  people  that  the  late  proceedings  of  the 
Virginia  Assembly  had  rilled  him  with  apprehension  and  alarm ; 
that  they  had  planted  thorns  upon  his  pillow ;  that  the  State 
had  quitted  the  sphere  in  which  she  had  been  placed  by  the 
Constitution,  and  in  daring  to  pronounce  upon  the  validity  of 
Federal  laws  had  gone  out  of  her  jurisdiction  in  a  manner  not 
warranted  by  any  authority,  and  in  the  highest  degree  alarming 
to  every  considerate  man;  that  such  opposition  on  the  part 
of  Virginia  to  the  acts  of  the  General  Government  must  beget 
their  enforcement  by  military  power;  that  this  would  probably 
produce  civil  war ;  civil  war,  foreign  alliances ;  and  that  foreign 
alliances  must  necessarily  end  in  subjugation  to  the  powers 
called  in.  He  conjured  the  people  to  pause  and  consider  well 
before  they  rushed  into  such  a  desperate  condition,  from  which 
there  could  be  no  retreat.  He  painted  to  their  imaginations 
Washington,  at  the  head  of  a  numerous  and  well-appointed 
army,  inflicting  upon  them  military  execution.  '  And  where/ 
he  asked,  'are  our  resources  to  meet  such  a  conflict?  Where 
is  the  citizen  of  America  who  will  dare  to  lift  his  hand  against 
the  father  of  his  country,  to  point  a  weapon  at  the  breast  of 
the  man  who  has  so  often  led  them  to  battle  and  victory  ? ' 
A  drunken  man  in  the  crowd,  John  Harvey  by  name,  threw 
up  his  arm  and  exclaimed  that  '  he  dared  do  it.'  '  No,' 
answered  Mr.  Henry,  rising  aloft  in  all  his  majesty,  and  in 
a  voice  most  solemn  and  penetrating,  '  you  dare  not  do  it ;  in 
such  a  parricidal  attempt,  the  steel  would  drop  from  your 
nerveless  arm  !  '  * 

'  The  look  and  gesture  at  this  moment/  said  Dr.  Rice,  who 
related  the  incident,  '  gave  to  these  words  an  energy  on  my 
mind  unequalled  by  anything  that  I  have  ever  witnessed.' 

*  Dr.  J.  H.  Rice  wrote  to  Wirt,  expressing  doubt  as  to 
whether  history  should  take  cognizance  of  such  incidents  as 
this.  Things  of  the  kind  might  be  misleading.  "  Perhaps  they 
will  give  an  incorrect  view  of  the  state  of  affairs  at  that 
period.  It  was  a  stormy  time,  indeed.  But  many  more  bitter 
words  would  have  been  spoken,  and  much  more  black  ink 
shed,  I  think,  before  the  people  would  have  fallen  to  cutting 
each  other's  throats." 

422 


RED  HILL 

"  Mr.  Henry,  proceeding  in  his  address,  asked  '  whether  the 
county  of  Charlotte  would  have  any  authority  to  dispute  an 
obedience  to  the  laws  of  Virginia ' ;  and  he  pronounced  Vir 
ginia  to  be  to  the  Union  what  the  county  of  Charlotte  was 
to  her. 

"  Having  denied  the  right  of  the  State  to  decide  upon  the 
constitutionality  of  Federal  laws,  he  added  that  it  might  be 
necessary  to  say  something  of  the  merits  of  the  Alien  and 
Sedition  laws,  which  had  given  occasion  to  the  action  of  the 
Assembly.  He  would  say  of  them  that  they  were  passed  by 
Congress,  and  Congress  is  a  wise  body.  That  these  laws  were 
too  deep  for  him;  they  might  be  right,  and  they  might  be 
wrong.  But  whatever  might  be  their  merits  or  demerits,  it 
belonged  to  the  people  who  held  the  reins  over  the  head  of  Con 
gress,  and  to  them  alone,  to  say  whether  they  were  acceptable 
or  otherwise  to  Virginians ;  and  that  this  must  be  done  by 
way  of  petition.  .  .  .  '  If/  said  he,  '  I  am  asked  what  is  to 
be  done  when  a  people  feel  themselves  intolerably  oppressed, 
my  answer  is  ready — overturn  the  government.  But  do  not, 
I  beseech  you,  carry  matters  to  this  length  without  provocation. 
Wait  at  least  until  some  infringement  is  made  upon  your  rights 
that  cannot  be  otherwise  redressed;  for  if  ever  you  recur  to 
another  change,  you  may  bid  adieu  forever  to  representative 
government.  You  can  never  exchange  the  present  govern 
ment  but  for  a  monarchy.  If  the  Administration  have  done 
wrong,  let  us  all  go  wrong  together.' 

"  Here  he  clasped  his  hands  and  waved  his  body  to  the  right 
and  left,  his  auditory  unconsciously  waving  with  him.  '  Let 
us/  said  he,  'trust  God  and  our  better  judgment  to  set  us  right 
hereafter.  United  we  stand,  divided  we  fall.  Let  us  not  split 
into  factions  which  must  destroy  that  union  upon  which  our 
existence  hangs.  Let  us  preserve  our  strength  for  the  French, 
the  English,  the  Germans,  or  whoever  else  shall  dare  invade 
our  territory,  and  not  exhaust  it  in  civil  commotions  and 
intestine  wars.' " 

When  Henry  had  ceased,  friends  took  him  up  in  their 
arms  and  bore  him  to  a  room.  Dr.  Rice,  standing  by, 
said :  "  The  sun  has  set  in  all  its  glory." 

It  was  not  until  later  that  the  expression,  "  the  rising 
and  the  setting  sun,"  was  applied  to  the  chief  orators 
at  this  Charlotte  gathering.  "  The  rising  sun "  was 

423 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

Randolph — "  young  Jack   Randle,"   as   he  was   locally 
called. 

"  For  some  moments,"  says  Garland,  "  he  [Randolph] 
stood  in  silence,  his  lips  quivering,  his  eyes  swimming  in 
tears;  at  length  he  began  a  modest  though  beautiful 
apology  for  rising  to  address  the  people  in  opposition 
to  '  the  venerable  father.' '''  He  was  hoarse,  and  there 
fore  could  not  do  himself  justice,  but  he  entertained 
and  held  the  great  assemblage  for  a  long  while — three 
hours,  it  is  said.  "  He  rarely  failed  with  a  Virginia 
assembly,"  comments  Henry  Adams ;  "  and  in  this  case 
his  whole  career  depended  on  success.  .  .  .  What 
he  said  is  not  recorded,  and  in  no  case  would  it  be  very 
material.  ...  At  this  period  Randolph  did  not  talk 
in  the  crisp,  nervous,  pointed  language  of  his  after  life, 
but  used  the  heroic  style."  Garland  attempts  a  sum 
mary  of  the  speech ;  but  Adams  surmises  that  it  "  could 
have  been  only  a  solemn  defence  of  States'  rights;  an 
appeal  to  State  pride  and  fear ;  an  ad  hominem  attack  on 
Patrick  Henry's  consistency,  and  more  or  less  effective 
denunciation  of  Federalists  in  general.  What  he  could 
not  answer,  and  what  must  become  the  more  impressive 
through  his  own  success,  was  the  splendor  of  a  senti 
ment  ;  history,  past  and  coming ;  the  awe  that  surrounds 
a  dying  prophet  threatening  a  new  doom  deserved." 
Adams  is  impelled  to  urge  that  nothing  in  Henry's 
life  was  nobler  than  his  last  public  act.  He  says,  with 
eloquence : 

"  The  greatest  orator  and  truest  patriot,  a  sound  and  con 
sistent  democrat,  sprung  from  the  people  and  adored  by  them — 
this  persistent  and  energetic  opponent  of  the  Constitution,  who 
had  denounced  its  over-swollen  powers  and  its  '  awful  squint 
towards  monarchy,'  now  came  forward,  not  for  office,  nor  to 
qualify  or  withdraw  anything  he  had  ever  said,  but  with  his 
last  breath  to  warn  the  people  of  Virginia  not  to  raise  their 
hand  against  the  national  government.  ...  In  the  light 

424 


RED  HILL 

o£  subsequent  history,  there  is  a  solemn  and  pathetic  grandeur 
in  this  dying  appeal  of  the  old  Revolutionary  orator." 

It  is  doubtful  whether  Henry  left  his  room  during 
Randolph's  speech.  "  About  this  whole  scene,"  says 
Moses  Coit  Tyler,  "  have  gathered  many  myths."  Some 
writers,  misled  by  a  life  of  Henry  in  "  The  New  Edin 
burgh  Encyclopedia,"  1817,  have  repeated  the  story  that 
Henry  replied  to  Randolph,  but  there  was  no  such  reply. 
Nor  can  there  be  entire  truth  in  the  anecdote  which 
makes  Henry  say  of  Randolph :  "  I  haven't  seen  the 
little  dog  before  since  he  was  at  school.  He  was  a  great 
atheist  then."  He  had  seen  Randolph  in  court  during 
Richard  Randolph's  trial,  and  probably  at  the  time  of 
the  argument  in  the  British  Debt  Cause.  Garland  says 
that  they  dined  together  after  the  Charlotte  meeting. 
Henry  said,  in  his  kind  way :  "  Young  man,  you  call 
me  '  father.'  Then,  my  son,  I  have  something  to  say 
unto  thee:  Keep  justice,  keep  truth — and  you  will  live 
to  think  differently."  But  all  his  life  Randolph  clung 
to  the  State  Rights  doctrine.  He  was  sincere  in  his 
belief.  It  was  his  fiercest  conviction. 

Oddly  enough,  at  the  April  election  both  Henry  and 
Randolph  were  chosen — one  to  the  Legislature,  the  other 
to  Congress ;  but  Henry  was  never  again  to  leave  Red 
Hill,  whither  he  had  returned  in  physical  distress.  He 
had  drawn  too  heavily  on  his  store  of  vitality.  He  was 
obliged  to  take  to  his  bed.  He  became  much  emaciated. 
Nevertheless,  he  got  out  of  bed  to  write  a  reply  to 
Timothy  Pickering,  Secretary  of  State,  declining  the 
appointment  as  Minister  to  France.  This  was  on  the 
1 6th  of  April.  May  found  him  weaker  still.  Intes 
tinal  disorder  developed.  The  leading  physician  in  that 
part  of  the  State,  Dr.  George  Cabell,  of  Lynchburg, 
remained  with  Henry  constantly.  "  Dear  Patsy,"  he 
wrote  to  his  daughter,  Mrs.  Martha  Fontaine,  who  had 

425 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

continued  to  dwell  in  the  Leatherwood  country,  "  I  am 
very  unwell,  and  Dr.  Cabell  is  with  me."  When  Mrs. 
Fontaine  and  others  of  his  kin  reached  Red  Hill,  they 
"  found  him  sitting  in  a  large  old-fashioned  arm-chair, 
in  which  he  was  easier  than  in  bed."  The  family's  dis 
tress  was  deepened  by  the  receipt  of  a  letter,  on  June  I, 
from  Judge  Roane,  who  wrote  to  Henry :  "  The  cup 
of  my  misery,  my  dear  sir,  is  now  full,  by  the  loss  of 
my  most  amiable,  virtuous,  and  affectionate  consort, 
your  dutiful  and  affectionate  daughter."  But  the  letter 
was  kept  from  Henry,  lest  the  shock  of  Anne's  death 
should  make  him  worse. 

Henry's  disease  was  intussusception — "  a  form  of 
obstruction  of  the  bowels,  in  which  part  of  the  intestine 
enters  within  that  part  immediately  beneath  it.  This 
can  best  be  understood  by  observing  what  takes  place 
in  the  fingers  of  a  tightly  fitting  glove,  as  they  turn 
outside  in  when  the  glove  is  pulled  off  the  hand."  In 
testinal  inflation  with  air,  or  surgery,  would  now  be  the 
treatment,  but  in  those  days  it  was  different. 

Henry  died  well — in  the  full  faith.  "  Oh,  how  wretched 
should  I  be  at  this  moment,"  he  said,  "  if  I  had  not 
made  my  peace  with  God !  "  There  was  a  Socratic  ease 
of  spirit  and  a  beautiful  stoicism  in  his  last  act.  His 
grandson,  Patrick  Henry  Fontaine,*  tells  us  about  it : 

"  On  June  6,  all  other  remedies  having  failed,  Dr. 
Cabell  proceeded  to  administer  to  him  a  dose  of  liquid 


*  Edward  Fontaine  wrote  in  the  Southern  Churchman, 
Alexandria,  Va.,  Feb.  4,  1869:  "My  father,  mother,  uncle, 
and  Aunt  Dandridge  gave  me  an  account  of  his  [Patrick 
Henry's]  last  illness  and  death,  which  I  think  worthy  of 
preservation."  Then  follows  in  the  Southern  Churchman  a 
statement  of  facts  identical  with  those  here  presented;  but 
our  text  follows  Moses  Coit  Tyler's  extract  from  the  Edward 
Fontaine  Manuscript  at  Cornell  University.  William  Wirt 
Henry's  account  is  practically  the  same. 

426 


RED  HILL 

mercury.     Taking  the  vial  in  his  hand,  and  looking  at 
it  a  moment,  the  dying  man  said: 

"  '  I  suppose,  doctor,  this  is  your  last  resort?' 
"  The  doctor  replied :  '  I  am  sorry  to  say,  Governor, 
that  it  is.  Acute  inflammation  of  the  intestines  has 
already  taken  place ;  and  unless  it  is  removed,  mortifica 
tion  will  ensue,  if  it  has  not  already  commenced,  which 
I  fear.' 

"  '  What  will  be  the  effect  of  this  medicine  ?  '  said 
the  old  man. 

*  It  will  give  you  immediate  relief,  or —    -'  the  kind- 
hearted  doctor  could  not  finish  the  sentence.     His  patient 
took  up  the  word: 

*  You  mean,  doctor,  that  it  will  give  relief  or  will 
prove  fatal  immediately  ?  ' 

:i  The  doctor  answered :  '  You  can  only  live  a  very 
short  time  without  it,  and  it  may  possibly  relieve  you/ 

'  Then  Patrick  Henry  said :  '  Excuse  me,  doctor, 
for  a  few  minutes ; '  and  drawing  over  his  eyes  a  silken 
cap  which  he  usually  wore,  and  still  holding  the  vial  in 
his  hand,  he  prayed,  in  clear  words,  a  simple,  childlike 
prayer  for  his  family,  for  his  country,  and  for  his  own 
soul,  then  in  the  presence  of  death.  Afterwards,  in 
perfect  calmness,  he  swallowed  the  medicine. 

"  Meanwhile,  Dr.  Cabell,  who  greatly  loved  him,  went 
out  upon  the  lawn,  and  in  his  grief  threw  himself  down 
upon  the  earth  under  one  of  the  trees,  weeping  bitterly. 
Soon,  when  he  had  sufficiently  mastered  himself,  the  doc 
tor  came  back  to  his  patient,  whom  he  found  calmly 
watching  the  congealing  of  the  blood  under  his  finger 
nails,  and  speaking  words  of  love  and  peace  to  his  family, 
who  were  weeping  around  his  chair.  Among  other 
things,  he  told  them  he  was  thankful  for  that  goodness 
of  God  which,  having  blessed  him  all  his  life,  was  then 
permitting  him  to  die  without  any  pain.  Finally,  fixing 
his  eyes  with  much  tenderness  on  his  dear  friend,  Dr. 

427 


THE  TRUE  PATRICK  HENRY 

Cabell,  with  whom  he  had  formerly  held  many  argu 
ments  respecting  the  Christian  religion,  he  asked  the 
doctor  to  observe  how  great  a  reality  and  benefit  that 
religion  was  to  a  man  about  to  die.  And  after  Patrick 
Henry  had  spoken  to  his  beloved  physician  those  few 
words  in  praise  of  something  which,  having  never  failed 
him  in  all  his  life  before,  did  not  then  fail  him  in  his 
very  last  need  of  it,  he  continued  to  breathe  very  softly 
for  some  moments ;  after  which  they  who  were  looking 
upon  him  saw  that  his  life  had  departed." 

The  garden  walk  at  Red  Hill  leads  to  his  grave. 
Box-tree  hedges  enclose  a  space  fifty  feet  square,  and 
here,  side  by  side,  are  two  oblong  slabs  of  marble.  The 
inscription  on  one  reads :  "  To  the  memory  of  Dorothea 
Dandridge,  wife  of  Patrick  Henry.  Born  1755.  Died 
February  14,  1831."  The  other  inscription  reads:  "To 
the  memory  of  Patrick  Henry.  Born  May  29,  1736. 
Died  June  6,  1799.  His  fame  his  best  epitaph." 


428 


APPENDIX 


NOTE 

WHEN  at  the  beginning  of  a  book  a  reader  looks  with  toler 
ance  upon  a  writer's  shortcomings,  and  not  only  gets  into  the 
habit  of  forgiving  them,  but  lends  a  hand  in  working  out  the 
theme,  all  is  apt  to  go  well.  But  since  what  is  one  man's 
literary  meat  is  another's  poison,  it  may  be  assumed  that  we 
have  had  a  reader  of  a  different  sort,  less  indulgent  of  the 
numerous  licenses  taken,  who  began  critically,  followed  without 
sympathy,  and  continued  cold  to  the  end.  In  which,  case  it 
is  apparent  that  somebody  still  lacks  a  satisfactory  grasp  of 
Patrick  Henry's  attributes.  But  we  have  kept  this  type  of 
reader  in  mind  all  along,  and  for  his  especial  benefit  now  make 
a  placatory  offering — the  well-rounded  contemporary  estimate 
of  Henry  by  Judge  Roane.  This  luminous  Roane  memorandum 
was  written  for  Wirt,  who  seems  to  have  undervalued  it. 
We  have  used  a  little  of  it  in  the  body  of  our  book,  but  no 
more  than  was  necessary  in  getting  side-lights.  The  verified, 
facts  in  the  Wirt  papers  supplied  by  Nathaniel  Pope,  George 
Dabney,  Charles  Dabney,  and  Judge  Edmund  Winston  have 
all  been  incorporated.  Part  of  Meredith's  narrative  has  ap 
peared,  but  the  main  portion  of  it  is  now  to  precede  Roane's. 
Together,  they  constitute  an  excellent  survey  of  Henry's  life. 

Spencer  Roane,  son  of  William,  born  April  4,  1762,  a  legis 
lator  in  1782  and  a  member  of  the  Executive  Council  in  1784, 
became  in  time  a  distinguished  judge  in  the  General  Court 
and  later  in  the  Virginia  Supreme  Court.  So  ardent  a  Repub 
lican  was  he  that  he  would  permit  no  appeals  from  his  Court 
to  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States.  He  died  Septem 
ber  4,  1822. 

Roane's  candor,  his  judicial  method,  his  plain  way  of  putting 
things,  his  dignity  of  expression — these  qualities  enter  into  his 
style,  which  is  patterned  upon  the  straightaway  narrative  style 
most  favored  by  substantial  Americans.  Though  the  memor 
andum  has  been  extensively  drawn  upon  by  Henry  writers,  it 
has  never  before  been  published  in  its  most  forceful  form — the 
consecutive  form.  It  is  here  copied  from  the  original  manu 
script  ;  and  is  given  in  its  entirety,  with  the  exception  of  a  few 
paragraphs  cut  out  to  avoid  repetition. 

429 


Appendix  A 


COLONEL  SAMUEL  MEREDITH'S   STATEMENT 

(AS   TAKEN   DOWN   BY  JUDGE   WILLIAM   H.   CABELL) 

PATRICK  HENRY  was  born  in  Hanover,  May  i8th  [Old  Style], 
1736.  His  father  was  a  Scotchman,  from  Aberdeen,  of  a  very 
liberal  and  extensive  education.3*  He  was  sent  to  a  common 
English  school  until  about  the  age  of  ten  years,  where  he 
learned  to  read  and  write,  and  acquired  some  little  knowledge 
of  arithmetic.  He  never  went  to  any  other  school,  public  or 
private,  but  remained  with  his  father,  who  was  his  only 
Tutor.b  With  him  he  acquired  a  knowledge  of  the  Latin 
language c  and  a  smattering  of  the  Greek.  He  became  well 
acquainted  with  the  Mathematics,d  of  which  he  was  very  fond. 
At  the  age  of  15  he  was  well  versed  in  both  ancient  and 
modern  History.  His  uncle  had  nothing  to  do  with  his  educa 
tion. 

Until  he  arrived  to  eminence  at  the  Bar,  there  was  nothing 
very  remarkable  in  the  person,  mind,  or  manners  of  Mr.  Henry. 
His  disposition  was  very  mild,  benevolent,  and  humane.  He  was 
quiet  and  inclined  to  be  thoughtful,  but  fond  of  society.  From 
his  earliest  days  he  was  an  attentive  observer  of  everything  of 
consequence  that  passed  before  him.  Nothing  escaped  his 
attention.  He  was  fond  of  reading,  but  indulged  much  in 
innocent  amusements.  He  was  remarkably  fond  of  his  gun. 
He  interested  himself  much  in  the  happiness  of  others,  par 
ticularly  of  his  sisters,  of  whom  he  had  eight,  and  whose  advo 
cate  he  always  was  when  any  favor  or  indulgence  was  to  be 
procured  from  their  mother. 

In  his  youth  he  seemed  regardless  of  the  appearance  of  his 
outside. dress,  but  was  unusually  attentive  in  having  clean  linen 
and  stockings.  He  was  not  remarkable  for  an  uncouth  or 
genteel  appearance  (the  preceding  remarks  are  particularly 
applicable  to  Mr.  Henry's  youth),  and  in  fact  there  was  nothing 
in  early  life  for  which  he  was  remarkable  except  his  invariable 
habit  of  close  and  attentive  observation.  He  had  a  nice  ear 
for  music,  and  when  he  was  about  the  age  of  12,  he  had  his 
collar  bone  broken,  and  during  the  confinement  learned  to  play 
very  well  on  the  flute.  He  was  also  an  excellent  performer  on 
the  violin,  but  the  whole  story  of  his  keeping  the  bar  of  a 

431 


APPENDIX 

tavern  is  utterly  false.  Col.  Meredith  was  about  four  years 
older  than  P.  Henry,  and  lived  within  four  miles  of  him  from 
his  birth  till  he  (P.  H.)  left  Hanover,  and  declares  that  there 
is  no  man  to  whom  such  an  occupation  would  have  been  more 
abhorrent.6 

He  was,  in  early  youth,  as  in  advanced  life,  plain  and  easy 
in  his  manners,  exempt  from  that  bashfulness  often  so  distress 
ing  to  young  persons  who  have  not  seen  much  company. 

It  is  not  true  that  he  left  his  father;  on  the  contrary, 
he  was  one  of  the  most  dutiful  sons  that  ever  lived.  Col. 
Meredith  often  heard  this  observation  made'  by  his  father. 

Although  an  excellent  performer  on  the  violin,  he  never 
played  but  in  select  companies f  and  for  the  amusement  of 
his  particular  friends. 

One  thing  is  remarkable  in  Mr.  Henry,  and  this  information 
comes  from  his  sister,  Mrs.  Meredith,  a  very  pious  woman,  that 
he  was  never  known  in  his  life  to  utter  the  name  of  God  except 
on  a  necessary  or  proper  occasion.8  He  was  through  life  a 
warm  friend  of  the  Christian  religion.  He  was  an  Episcopalian, 
but  very  friendly  to  all  other  sects,  particularly  the  Presby 
terian.  His  father  was  an  Episcopalian,  his  mother  a  Presby 
terian.  He  was  so  pleased  with  Soame  Jenyns'  Internal  View 
of  the  Christian  Religion  that,  meeting  with  a  copy  of  it  when 
he  was  Governor,  or  shortly  after,  he  had  several  hundred 
copies  printed  and  distributed  at  his  own  expense.  Doddridge's 
Rise  and  Progress  of  Religion  was  his  favorite  author  on  the 
subject  of  Religion. 

About  the  age  of  15  he  became  clerk  for  some  merchant  in 
Hanover,  and  continued  in  that  employment  for  one  year, 
when  his  father  purchased  a  parcel  of  goods  for  him  and  his 
brother  William,  and  they  commenced  business  on  their  own 
account.  They  were  jointly  interested,  but  Patrick  was  the 
principal  manager.  They,  however,  did  not  continue  business 
longer  than  one  year,  when  it  was  found  necessary  to  abandon 
it,  as  they  had  injured  themselves  by  granting  too  extensive 
credit.  P.  H.  was  then  engaged  in  winding  up  the  business  of 
the  concern  until  he  was  married,  the  Fall  after  he  was  18, 
to  a  daughter  of  Mr.  John  Shelton,  who  lived  in  the  forks 
of  Hanover.  She  was  a  woman  of  some  fortune  and  much 
respectability,  by  whom  he  had  six  children.  She  died  about 
the  year  '70  or  '7i.h  In  April  '76  i  he  was  married  to  a  daughter 
of  Mr.  Nath'l  Dandridge,  now  the  wife  of  Judge  Winston,  by 
whom  he  had  nine  children — living  at,  or  some  short  time 
before,  his  death. 

432 


APPENDIX 

P.  H.  lived  in  Hanover  till  about  the  year  '64  or  '65,  when  he 
removed  to  Louisa,  which  County  he  represented  when  he  made 
the  famous  stand  against  the  Stamp  Act.  He  returned  to 
Hanover  in  '67  or  '68,  where  he  purchased  Scotch  Town,  a 
noted  place,  the  former  seat  of  Col.  Chessil,  where  he  re 
mained  until  he  was  elected  Governor.  On  his  resignation 
as  Governor  he  removed  to  Leatherwood,  in  Henry  County, 
where  he  had  purchased  a  large  body  of  land.  He  remained 
there  several  years,  then  gave  the  most  of  his  land  there  to  his 
children  by  his  first  wife,  retaining  the  balance.  He  then  re 
moved  k  to  Prince  Edward,  where  he  continued  6  or  7  years, 
and  then  moved  to  Long  Island,  in  Campbell,  where  he  con 
tinued  three  or  four  years,  and  then  moved  to  Booker's  Ferry 
on  Stanton  river,  where  he  lived  till  his  death,  except  that  he 
occasionally  moved  from  Booker's  Ferry,  or  Red  Hill  (the 
name  of  his  seat),  to  Long  Island  during  the  sickly  months. 
His  furniture  was  all  of  the  plainest  sort,  consisting  of  neces 
saries  only;  nothing  for  show  or  ornament.  He  regarded  as 
nothing  the  trouble  of  moving,  and  would  change  his  dwelling 
with  as  little  concern  as  a  common  man  would  change  a  coat 
of  which  he  was  tired.  He  was  uncommonly  hospitable;  his 
attentions  were  not  confined  to  the  rich,  the  great,  or  wise, 
but  he  was  familiar  with  every  man  of  good  character. 

On  his  first  marriage,  he  received  from  his  father-in-law 
a  tract  of  land  and  14  or  15  negroes;  and  also  a  tract  of  land 
and  4  or  5  negroes  from  his  father.  He  then  commenced 
farmer,  and  so  continued  till  he  commenced  the  study  of  the 
Law,  about  18  months  before  the  trial  in  Hanover  Court  of 
the  famous  cause  commonly  called  the  "  Parsons'  Cause." 

He  did  not  read  Law  under  the  direction  of  any  person.1  It 
was  not  even  made  known  to  any  of  his  friends  until  he 
consulted  his  friend  John  Lewis  as  to  his  fitness  to  commence 
the  practice,  who  encouraged  him  to  apply  for  a  license,  in 
which  application  he  was  successful. 

He  began  the  practice  in  Hanover  and  Louisa,  but  got  little 
or  no  business  and  made  no  figure  until  the  above  mentioned 
trial  in  Hanover.  It  should  have  been  observed  that  he  was 
not  more  than  six  or  eight  months  engaged  in  the  study  of 
the  Law,m  during  which  time  he  secluded  himself  from  the 
world,  availing  himself  of  the  use  of  a  few  Law  books  owned 
by  his  father.  .  .  . 

Col.  John  Henry,  the  father  of  Patrick  Henry,  had  one  other 
son,  named  William,  and  seven  daughters.  Wm.  received  an 
estate  from  his  father  in  Fluvanna,  near  the  mouth  of  Hard- 
28  433 


APPENDIX 

ware,  where  he  died,  leaving  only  one  child,  which  died  in  a 
short  time  after. 

About  the  year  '64  or  '65,  Col.  John  Henry's  fortune  having 
been  much  reduced  from  a  want  of  good  management  and 
knowledge  of  plantation  affairs,  he  engaged  in  the  business 
of  keeping  a  school,  and  took  charge  of  10  or  12  boys,  whom 
he  taught  for  about  twelve  months,  when  he  was  assisted  by 
a  Scotchman  whose  name  was  Walker.  He  then  took  about 
twenty  scholars,  and  continued  for  four  or  five  years  to  teach 
that  number,  when  he  died.  .  .  . 

P.  H.  in  a  communication  to  Col.  M.  stated  his  motives  for 
resigning  his  commission  as  Colonel.  He  conceived  himself 
neglected  by  younger  officers  having  been  put  above  him  and 
preferred  to  him,  particularly  in  the  affair  of  the  Great  Bridge, 
where  he  wished  to  have  commanded,  but  Col.  Woodford  re 
ceived  that  appointment. 

He  disliked  being  kept  in  and  about  Williamsburg  and  not 
appointed  to  some  more  important  Post  or  expedition.  He 
was  thus  induced  to  think  he  was  neglected  by  those  who  had 
the  power  of  appointment.  He  therefore  resigned. 

NOTES  ON  COL.  MEREDITH'S  NARRATIVE 
(BY  s.  R.  [JUDGE  ROANE]) 

(He  married  Mr.  H.'s  sister,  and  had  good  opportunity  of 
information  on  the  subjects  on  which  he  speaks.) 

a  So  I  have  always  understood. 

bHis  father,  therefore,  taught  him. 

c  I  have  always  supposed  he  had  learned  some  Latin ;  I 
have  no  knowledge  as  to  Greek. 

d  I  have  an  idea  that  he  was  fond  of  Mathematics  and 
Natural  Philosophy,  tho'  I  suppose  he  was  not  regularly  edu 
cated  in  the  latter. 

e  This  I  entirely  believe  to  have  been  the  case. 

f  I  never  heard  him  play,  tho'  he  may  have  done  so  in 
the  former  part  of  his  life,  or  when  I  was  not  present;  tho'  I 
rather  think  he  never  played  in  his  latter  years. 

g  I  never  heard  him  swear  that  I  remember. 

h  Judge  Winston  says  in  1775. 

I  Winston  says  in  '77 — which  I  think  was  the  case,  as  I  have 
always  understood  it  was  after  he  was  Governor. 

k  This  was  after  he  resigned  the  Government,  in  Dec.  '86. 

I 1  never  understood  that  he  did. 
**  Winston  says  six  weeks. 

434 


Appendix  B 


JUDGE  SPENCER  ROANE'S   MEMORANDUM 

MY  acquaintance  with  the  late  Patrick  Henry  did  not  com 
mence  till  the  year  1783.  In  the  Spring  of  that  year  I  met 
him  in  the  General  Assembly,  as  a  Delegate  for  the  County 
of  Henry,  and  served  four  sessions  with  him  in  that  year  and 
the  "next 

Although  during  that  period  I  often  heard  him  speak,  I 
formed  no  very  particular  acquaintance  with  him,  as  I  was  then 
a  very  young  man,  and  was  naturally  averse  from  pushing 
myself  into  the  society  of  so  distinguished  a  character. 

Richard  Henry  Lee  was  also  a  Delegate  during  those  years 
and  with  him  I  was  well  acquainted,  almost  from  my  child 
hood.  He  had  been  very  often  at  my  father's  house,  who 
had  long  served  in  the  Assembly  with  him,  as  well  as  with 
Patrick  Henry,  and  when  a  young  man  had  written  in  the 
office  of  Col.  Geo.  Lee,  the  Clerk  of  Westmoreland  and  a 
relation  of  R.  H.  Lee's. 

In  the  Fall  session  of  '84,  Mr.  Henry  was  elected  Governor 
the  second  time,  commencing  in  December  of  that  year.  I 
was  elected  a  Councillor  the  same  session,  to  commence  in  the 
May  following.  Mr.  Henry  continued  Governor  then  two  years, 
and  I  remained  in  the  Council  till  the  end  of  the  year  '86,  when 
I  resigned. 

During  that  time  I  had  an  opportunity  to  become  well 
acquainted  with  Mr.  H.,  and  especially  as  I  had,  during  the 
time,  formed  connection  in  his  family,  in  which  I  was,  of 
course,  domesticated. 

After  he  had  ceased  to  be  Governor,  and  I  had  left  the 
Council,  owing  to  the  distance  by  which  we  were  separated 
I  only  saw  him  in  the  Assembly,  of  which  he  was  a  Delegate 
from  Prince  Edward  and  I  a  member  of  the  Senate,  until  I 
rode  the  Circuit  as  a  Judge  of  the  General  Court,  in  1790  and 
the  four  succeeding  years.  I  was,  during  those  years,  at 
least  three  times  on  his  Circuit,  and  every  time  left  my  family 
at  his  residence  in  Prince  Edward,  and  at  Long  Island,  and 
accompanied  him  to  the  Courts  of  Prince  Edward  and  New 
London,  in  which  he  then  practised,  and  on  to  Great  Bridge 
Court,  whither  he  went  to  defend  a  criminal.  This  gave  me 

435 


APPENDIX 

an  opportunity  to  see  him  in  a  new  character:  that  of  a 
counsellor  in  civil  and  criminal  cases. 

After  I  ceased  to  ride  the  Circ't,  by  being  elected  into  the 
Court  of  Appeals,  and  he  quitted  the  practice  of  law,  I  never 
again  saw  him,  owing  to  the  distance,  though  I  was  at  his 
house  on  my  last  Circuit,  in  the  Fall  of  '94.  He  was  always 
in  his  lifetime  very  cordial  and  affectionate  towards  me. 

I  have  entered  into  this  detail  to  show  that,  although  I  am 
unable  to  say  much  of  his  life  or  character  prior  to  '83,  except 
from  the  information  of  his  family  and  others,  I  have  had 
some  opportunity  to  be  well  acquainted  with  him  since  that 
period.  .  .  . 

With  respect  to  the  domestic  character  of  Mr.  Henry, 
nothing  could  be  more  amiable.  In  every  relation,  as  a  hus 
band,  father,  master,  and  neighbor,  he  was  entirely  exemplary. 
It  is  no  exception  from  this  character  that,  I  conceive,  he 
meditated  an  act  of  injustice  towards  some  of  his  first  chil 
dren,  by  his  last  Will ;  one  of  whom,  too,  at  least,  was  a  favor 
ite  child.  That  is  to  be  ascribed  to  the  extreme  debility 
under  which  he  then  labored,  and  the  urgent  importunity  of 
an  interested  second  wife,  who  assailed  him  with  the  claims 
of  her  nine  children.  (This  occurrence,  of  course,  will  not 
be  mentioned  in  his  biography.  I  may  be  mistaken  in  the 
idea,  and  it  had  better  sink  into  oblivion.*) 

The  particulars  of  this  transaction  are  detailed  in  a  suit  I 
brought  in  the  Court  of  Chancery,  against  his  Executors,  after 
his  death,  and  in  which  I  recovered.  I  have  no  wish  to  bring 
that  transaction  into  this  detail ;  I  only  now  mention  it  for  the 
purpose  of  declaring  that  even  that  occurrence  forms  no 
exception  against  his  justice  as  a  parent;  it  was  entirely  owing 
to  the  debility  and  to  influences  .  .  .  [illegible]. 

As  to  the  disposition  of  Mr.  Henry,  it  was  the  best  imagin 
able.  I  am  positive  that  I  never  saw  him  in  a  passion,  nor 
apparently  even  out  of  temper.  Circumstances  which  would  have 
highly  irritated  other  men  had  no  such  visible  effect  on  him.  He 
was  always  calm  and  collected,  and  the  rude  attacks  of  his  ad 
versaries  in  debate  only  whetted  the  poignancy  of  his  satire. 
Witness  his  cutting  reply  to  F.  Corbin  in  the  Virginia  Assembly, 
about  bowing,  of  which  no  doubt  Mr.  Wirt  has  been  informed. 
It  exceeded  anything  of  the  kind  I  ever  heard.  He  spoke  and 
acted  this  reply,  and  Corbin  sank  at  least  a  foot  in  his  seat. 

*  Roane  was  of  course  an  interested  party.  Patrick  Henry's 
provision  for  the  children  of  his  first  wife  had  been  liberal. 

436 


APPENDIX 

Shortly  after  the  Constitution  was  adopted,  a  series  of  the 
most  abusive  and  scurrilous  pieces  came  out  against  him,  under 
the  signature  of  Decius.  They  were  supposed  to  be  written 
by  Mr.  Nicholas  (Americanus),  with  the  assistance  of  other 
more  important  men.  They  assailed  Mr.  Henry's  conduct  in 
the  Convention,  and  slandered  his  character  by  various  stones 
hatched  up  against  him.  These  pieces  were  extremely  hateful 
to  all  Mr.  H.'s  friends,  and  indeed  to  a  great  portion  of  the 
community. 

I  was  at  his  house  in  Prince  Edward  during  the  thickest 
of  them,  and  I  declare  that  he  seemed  to  evince  no  more  desire 
to  see  the  newspapers  containing  them  than  the  most  indifferent 
person  in  the  County.  He  evinced  no  feeling  on  the  occasion, 
and  far  less  condescended  to  parry  the  effects  thereof  on  the 
public  mind.  It  was  too  puny  a  contest  for  him,  and  he  reposed 
upon  the  consciousness  of  his  own  integrity. 

Patrick  Henry  had  a  remarkable  faculty  of  adapting  him 
self  to  his  company.  Of  this  talent,  so  important  to  him  as 
a  public  speaker,  I  shall  presently  speak;  at  present  I  have 
only  reference  to  the  ordinary  intercourse  of  society.  He 
would  be  pleasant  and  cheerful  with  persons  of  any  class  or 
condition,  vicious  and  abandoned  persons  always  excepted. 
He  preferred  those  of  character  and  talents,  but  would  amuse 
himself  with  any  who  could  contribute  to  his  amusement. 

Although  sufficiently  tenacious  of  his  character  and  dignity, 
he  was  not  to  be  offended  by  rude  liberties  when  no  offence 
was  intended.  I  will  give  one  instance  which  struck  me  in  a 
remarkable  manner.  He  had  been  to  Greenbrier  Court  to 
defend  a  criminal  named  Holland,  of  which  trial  I  shall  speak 
more  particularly  hereafter. 

This  trial  had  attracted  great  attention  in  the  upper  country 
and  in  Mr.  Henry's  own  neighborhood.  I  was  returning  there 
from  with  Mr.  H.,  and  within  15  miles  of  his  house  we  saw 
a  laboring  man  at  a  Brake  by  the  road,  and  believe  he  was 
known  to  Mr.  H.  He  accosted  Mr.  Henry  with  "  How  do  you 
do,  Colonel  ?  "  Mr.  H.  replied.  He  then  asked  Mr.  H.  what 
he  had  done  with  Holland.  Mr.  H.  replied  that  he  was  ac 
quitted,  on  which  the  man  replied,  with  great  seeming 
exultation,  "  Hurrah  for  old  Henry ! "  Mr.  H.,  not  at  all 
offended  with  the  coarseness  of  this  exclamation,  bid  the  man 
good-bye,  and  jogged  down  the  road,  smiling. 

Mr.  Henry  was  a  child  of  Nature.  He  preferred,  I  believe, 
being  in  the  country,  and  to  be  free  from  the  restraints  of 
polished  society;  yet  he  could  readily  adapt  himself  to  that 

437 


APPENDIX 

situation.  When  he  was  Governor  the  second  time  (and  I 
presume  more  so  the  first),  he  rarely  appeared  in  the  streets, 
and  never  without  a  scarlet  cloak,  black  clothes,  and  a  dressed 
wig,  &c.  The  ideas  attached  to  the  office  of  Governor,  as 
handed  down  from  the  Royal  Government,  had  not  then  got 
down  to  their  present  level;  and  I  expect  he  considered  this 
course  a  just  adaptation  to  the  public  opinion.  .  .  .  With 
great  simplicity  and  suavity  of  manner,  he  had  as  much  true 
dignity  as  any  man.  .  .  .  His  dress  was  plain,  as  also  was 
his  house  and  furniture,  and  he  was  careless  about  his  diet.  He 
took  no  delight  in  the  pleasures  of  the  table.  He  was  one  of 
the  most  temperate  men  I  ever  knew.  He  rarely  drank  any 
wine  or  spirits,  and  his  frequent  custom  was,  in  the  country, 
to  go  to  a  wooden  cask  and  drink  water  out  of  a  gourd. 

I  believe  he  had  been  fond  of  hunting  and  fishing  in  his 
youth,  but  I  saw  nothing  of  it  after  I  became  acquainted  with 
him ;  except  that  when  he  lived  at  Long  Island  he  showed  me  a 
Slope,  or  fish  trap,  which  he  made  across  a  branch  of  Staunton 
river,  that  furnished  fish  for  his  family,  and  spoke  with 
pleasure  of  a  buck  which  had  recently  been  caught  therein  by 
having  been  brought  down  the  river  in  the  current. 

I  have  no  doubt,  from  report,  but  Mr.  H.  had  been  a  good 
performer  on  the  violin,  and  was  in  other  respects  a  musical 
man ;  but  I  never  heard  him  play  on  a  violin,  or  any  other 
instrument,  or  even  sing  or  hum  a  tune.  His  daughters  played 
on  musical  instruments,  but  these  seemed  not  much  to  engage 
his  attention. 

His  great  delight  was  in  conversation,  and  in  the  society  of 
his  friends  and  family,  and  in  the  resources  of  his  own  mind. 
I  have  understood  from  the  family  that  he  had  engaged  in 
trade  when  young,  and  had  failed ;  but  I  never  heard  that  he 
was  ever  a  bar-keeper,  nor  do  I  believe  it.  If  his  father- 
in-law  owned  a  tavern,  it  is  possible  that  he  might  have  assisted 
gratuitously,  at  times,  but  the  man's  nature  must  have  changed 
if  he  could  ever  have  been  adapted  to  a  calling  of  this  kind. 
I  have  no  conception  of  any  man  who  would  have  been  more 
abhorrent  at  mixing  toddy  and  seeing  it  drunk  in  a  tavern 
than  Patrick  Henry.  The  case  is,  however,  unimportant;  his 
rise  in  the  world  has  been  sufficiently  remarkable  without 
introducing  into  his  history  fiction  of  this  kind. 

As  to  the  kind  of  clothes  in  which  he  went  dressed  in 
his  youth,  according  to  some  of  the  statements,  we  must 
refer  (unless  they  be  ascribed  to  a  poverty  so  extreme  as  to 
have  denied  him  better,  and  which  I  have  never  understood 

438 


APPENDIX 

was  the  case)  to  the  customs  of  the  times  in  which  he  lived. 
I  can  myself  remember  when  there  was  only  one  four-wheeled 
carriage,  and  two  pair  of  boots  (called  shoe-boots),  in  the 
wealthy  and  fashionable  County  of  Essex.  I  myself  delighted 
to  go  barefooted  and  in  trousers  until  I  went  to  College, 
and  I  have  heard  my  father  say  that  his  father,  when  pos 
sessed  of  perhaps  100  Negroes,  and  when  he  was  a  Colonel  of 
Militia  and  Justice  of  the  quorum,  would  in  his  shirt  and 
trousers  (in  summer)  visit  two  or  three  of  his  plantations  and 
return  home  to  breakfast. 

I  have  said  that  Mr.  Henry  could  adapt  himself  to  all 
men  in  a  remarkable  manner.  He  was  also  well  acquainted 
with  the  transactions  of  life,  or,  in  other  words,  was  a  man 
of  business.  He  could  buy  or  sell  a  horse  or  a  Negro  as  well 
as  anybody,  and  was  peculiarly  a  judge  of  the  value  and  quality 
of  land.  He  made  several  excellent  bargains  for  lands  in  the 
latter  part  of  his  life,  owing  to  his  foresight  and  judgment. 
When  I  have  told  him  that  his  lands  were  too  far  from  market, 
he  once  replied  to  me  that  when  he  lived  at  Leatherwood, 
180  miles  from  Richmond,  persons  passing  by  his  house,  from 
the  upper  parts  of  North  Carolina,  envied  him  his  contiguity 
to  market. 

No  man  ever  vaunted  less  of  his  achievements  than  Mr. 
Henry.  I  hardly  ever  heard  him  speak  of  those  great  achieve 
ments  which  form  the  prominent  part  of  his  biography.  As 
for  boasting,  he  was  an  entire  stranger  to  it;  unless  it  be  that 
in  his  latter  days  he  seemed  proud  of  the  goodness  of  his 
lands,  and,  I  believe,  wished  to  be  thought  wealthy.  It  is  my 
opinion  that  he  was  better  pleased  to  be  flattered  as  to  his 
wealth  than  as  to  his  great  talents.  This  I  have  accounted  for 
by  reflecting  that  he  had  long  been  under  narrow  and  difficult 
circumstances  as  to  property,  from  which  he  was  at  length 
happily  relieved,  whereas  there  never  was  a  time  when  his 
talents  had  not  shone  conspicuous,  tho'  he  always  seemed  un 
conscious  of  them. 

With  respect  to  Mr.  Henry's  education,  he  was  equally 
silent  on  that  subject  to  S.  R.  If  he  got  a  license  after  six 
weeks'  reading,  that  was  the  very  reason  why  he  would  not 
mention  it,  as  it  would  look  like  boasting. 

I  never  heard  Mr.  Henry  (nor  Mr.  Pendleton)  say  that 
he  read  Mr.  Pendleton's  books,  nor  do  I  believe  it.  If  he  had 
been  under  any  obligations  to  Mr.  P.,  he  would  have  been 
grateful  for  them;  but,  on  the  contrary,  I  have  reason  to 
believe  that  he  was  not  very  fond  of  Mr.  P.,  nor  Mr.  P. 

439 


APPENDIX 

of  him.  I  have  heard  Mr.  Henry  say  that  Mr.  Pendleton  was 
too  much  devoted  to  the  aristocracy  of  former  times;  that  he 
was  not  thorough-going  enough  in  the  Revolution ;  that  he 
was  in  favor  of  an  established  church,  when  as  a  member  of 
Congress  he  was  contending  for  civil  liberty ;  and  that  Mr.  P., 
on  the  bench  of  Caroline  Court,  justified  the  imprisonment  of 
several  Baptist  Preachers,  who  were  defended  by  Mr.  Henry, 
on  the  heinous  charge  of  worshipping  God  according  to  the 
dictates  of  their  own  consciences;  and  that  Mr.  Pendleton 
was  a  man  of  too  much  courtesy  in  his  passage  through  life, 
thereby  meaning  that  he  had  too  little  candor,  &c.  On  the 
contrary,  I  have  heard  Mr.  P.  insinuate  of  Mr.  H.,  as  far  as 
he  could  do  so  in  my  hearing,  who  was  connected  with  him, 
that  he  was  a  demagogue  and  a  popular  leader,  &c.  .  .  .  I 
mention  these  things  to  show  that  I  do  not  believe  that  Mr. 
Henry  ever  read  Law  with  Mr.  P.  or  owed  him  any  obligations. 

As  to  Mr.  H.'s  general  education,  I  do  not  believe  that  he 
had  a  regular  academical  one,  but  I  do  believe  that  he  had 
some  knowledge  of  the  Latin  tongue,  and  acquaintance  with 
some  of  the  principal  branches  of  Science.  These  a  man  of 
Mr.  H.'s  genius  could  not  fail  to  acquire  in  a  consider 
able  degree,  if  not  in  the  school  room,  at  least  at  the  dinner 
table  of  his  father,  who  was  a  well  educated  man.  If  other 
men  could  not  catch  an  education  under  these  circumstances, 
it  does  not  follow  that  Mr.  H.  could  not,  though  it  is  said 
in  some  of  the  statements  that  he  was  taught  by  his  father. 

His  genius  was  as  far-soaring  above  those  of  ordinary  men  as 
is  the  first  qualitied  land  of  Kentucky  beyond  the  sandy  barrens 
of  Pea  Ridge  (a  barren  ridge  in  King  &  Queen). 

As  to  his  using  a  translation  of  Livy,  he  may  have  never 
been  able  to  read  the  original  with  perfect  ease,  or  have  for 
gotten  the  language.  I  was  once  able  to  read  Homer  with 
almost  as  much  ease  as  the  Spectator,  which  I  owed  to  our 
good  friend  Warden  and  others,  but  am  now  obliged  to  read 
Pope's  Homer,  which  Dr.  Johnson  (I  think)  says,  and  says 
truly,  is  not  Homer's  Homer. 

As  for  the  general  character  of  Mr.  Henry's  library,  I  readily 
believe  that  he  had  not  a  complete  or  regular  one.  He  was  not 
a  man  of  regularity  or  system.  When  at  his  dwelling  at  Prince 
Edward,  I  lodged  with  my  family  in  his  study  (house  room 
being  scarce),  and  there  saw  his  library  fully.  I  remarked  that 
it  consisted  sometimes  of  odd  volumes,  &c.,  but  of  good  books. 
I  believe  that  an  inventory  and  catalogue  of  the  books  he  died 
possessed  of  is  filed  in  my  former  suit  in  the  Chancery,  before 

440 


APPENDIX 

mentioned,  and  I  expect  it  would  be  found  to  come  within  this 
description.  That  he  was  acquainted  with  ancient  History  and 
Mythology  needs  no  further  proof  than  the  eloquent  parallel 
used  by  him  in  his  argument  on  the  British  Debt  Case,  between 
Rhadamanthus,  Nero,  and  George  III. 

I  believe  he  was  very  fond  of  History,  Magazines,  good 
poetry  or  plays  (say  Shakespeare's),  and  I  think  was  a  very 
good  geographer.  He  was  particularly  well  acquainted  with 
the  geography,  rivers,  soil,  climate,  &c.,  of  America.  His 
speeches  show  that  he  was  well  acquainted  with  English  His 
tory.  I  think  he  had  some  acquaintance  with  Mathematics  and 
Natural  Philosophy. 

After  all,  while  I  believe  that  altho'  Mr.  H.  had  not  a 
complete  education,  his  great  merit  consists  in  this,  that 
he  acquired  it  by  means  impervious  to  ordinary  men. 

There  was  one  trait  in  Mr.  Henry,  flowing  from  his  good 
disposition  and  his  magnanimity,  which  did  him  great  credit 
and  is  universally  admitted.  He  was  extremely  kind  to  young 
men  in  debate,  and  ever  ready  to  compliment  even  his  adver 
saries  where  it  was  merited ;  of  the  latter  class,  his  high 
eulogium  upon  Col.  Innes'  eloquence  in  the  Virginia  Con 
vention  will  be  recollected;  of  the  former  class,  the  instances 
were  innumerable.  I  will  mention  one  which  occurred  in  my 
own  case.  In  the  Spring  of  the  year  '83,  several  of  the  most 
respectable  of  my  constituents  of  the  County  of  Essex  tarred 
and  feathered  one  Jas.  Williamson.  He  had  been  a  merchant 
in  Tappahannock,  had  gone  to  the  British  and  endeavored  to 
bring  up  tenders  to  burn  the  town  during  the  war,  and  after 
the  peace  had  returned  to  Tappahannock,  where  he  was  coun 
tenanced  by  some  of  the  inhabitants.  This  gave  such  um 
brage  that  he  was  pursued,  caught,  and  tarred  and  feathered 
by  the  principal  men  of  Essex.  They  were  prosecuted  for 
this  misdemeanor  in  the  general  Court.  While  the  prosecution 
was  still  pending,  these  citizens  sent  a  petition  to  me  in  the 
Spring  of  '84,  praying  the  Assembly  to  arrest  the  prosecution. 
I  presented  the  petition,  and  got  a  law  of  indemnity  in  some 
progress,  taking  care  to  state,  as  the  fact  was,  that  the  act 
was  committed  before  the  definitive  treaty  was  signed,  which 
was  some  alleviation  of  their  conduct. 

Mr.  Henry  took  me  out,  one  day,  and  said  that  he  admired 
the  Whig  spirit  which  actuated  me,  but  that  the  intervention 
of  the  Legislature  could  not  be  justified.  I  told  him  that  the 
transaction  was  irregular,  but  that  the  provocation  was  great, 
and  the  act  done,  in  some  sense,  flagranfe  bello.  He  persisted 

441 


APPENDIX 

in  his  opinion,  and  I  maintained  my  ground,  intimated  that 
I  hoped  he  would  not  oppose  me,  but  that  if  he  did,  I  must 
nevertheless  proceed.  He  left  me,  and  did  not  oppose  me, 
which  I  ascribe  to  the  trait  now  in  question,  and  the  act  of 
indemnity  passed.  This  is  one  small  instance,  but  a  thousand 
others  might  be  mentioned. 

Although  I  was  personally  unacquainted  with  Mr.  Henry 
until  1783,  I  was  no  stranger  to  his  character  before  that  time. 
A  volunteer  at  the  age  of  thirteen,  armed  with  a  short  carbine 
and  tomahawk,  and  clothed  in  a  hunting  shirt  with  the  words 
"  Liberty  or  Death  "  engraved  in  capitals  over  my  left  breast, 
I  could  not  be  indifferent  to  the  character  of  that  man  who 
electrified  the  American  public  by  his  eloquence  in  council, 
and  roused  them  to  resistance  at  a  critical  time  by  taking  the 
field. 

I  had  even  before  this  formed  a  high  opinion  of  this  man's 
eloquence,  talents,  and  patriotism.  My  father,  a  burgess  for 
Essex  from  1768  to  the  Revolution,  and  once  or  twice  during 
the  war,  always  came  home  in  raptures  with  the  man.  That 
a  plain  man,  of  ordinary  though  respected  family,  should  beard 
the  aristocracy  by  whom  we  were  then  cursed  and  ruled, 
and  overthrow  them  in  the  cause  of  independence,  was  grate 
ful  to  a  man  of  my  father's  Whig  principles.  He  considered 
Henry  as  the  organ  of  the  great  body  of  the  people ;  as  the 
instrument  by  whom  the  big-wigs  were  to  be  thrown  down, 
and  liberty  and  independence  established. 

It  is  among  the  first  things  I  can  remember,  that  my  father 
paid  the  expenses  of  a  Scotch  tutor  residing  in  his  family, 
named  Bradfute,  a  man  of  learning,  to  go  with  him  to 
Williamsburg  to  hear  Patrick  Henry  speak;  and  that  he 
laughed  at  Bradfute,  on  his  return,  for  having  been  so  much 
enchanted  with  his  eloquence  as  to  have  unconsciously  spirted 
tobacco  juice  from  the  gallery  on  the  heads  of  the  members, 
and  to  have  nearly  fallen  from  the  gallery  into  the  House. 
At  a  subsequent  time,  too,  my  father  carried  another  tutor 
and  myself,  when  not  ten  years  old,  to  Williamsburg,  on  pur 
pose  to  hear  Patrick  Henry  speak,  but  no  occasion  brought 
him  out  before  the  vacation  had  expired,  and  we  returned 
home.  .  .  . 

With  these  impressions,  I  met  Patrick  Henry  in  the  Assembly 
in  May,  1783.  I  also  then  met  with  Richard  Henry  Lee.  I 
lodged  with  Lee  one  or  two  sessions,  and  was  perfectly 
acquainted  with  him,  while  I  was  as  yet  a  stranger  to  Mr. 
Henry.  These  two  gentlemen  were  the  great  leaders  in  the 

442 


APPENDIX 

House  of  Delegates,  and  were  almost  constantly  opposed.  Not 
withstanding  my  habits  of  intimacy  with  Mr.  Lee,  I  found 
myself  obliged  to  vote  with  Patrick  Henry  against  him  in 
1783,  and  against  Madison  in  1784  (in  which  year,  I  think,  R.  H. 
Lee  was  sent  to  Congress),  but  with  several  important  excep 
tions.  I  voted  against  him  (P.  H.),  I  recollect,  on  the  subject 
of  the  refugees — he  was  for  permitting  their  return ;  on  the  sub 
ject  of  a  general  assessment,  and  the  act  of  incorporating  the 
Episcopal  Church.  I  voted  with  him  in  general,  because  he 
was,  as  I  thought,  a  more  practical  statesman  than  Madison 
(time  has  made  Madison  more  practical),  and  a  less  selfish 
one  than  Lee. 

As  an  orator,  Mr.  Henry  demolished  Madison  with  as  much 
ease  as  Sampson  did  the  cords  that  bound  him  before  he 
was  shorn;  Mr.  Lee  held  a  greater  competition.  There  were 
many  other  great  men  in  the  House,  but  as  orators  they  cannot 
be  named  with  Henry  or  Lee.  Mr.  Lee  was  a  polished 
gentleman.  His  person  was  not  very  good,  and  he  had  lost 
the  use  of  one  of  his  hands,  but  his  manner  was  perfectly 
graceful.  His  language  was  always  chaste,  and  although 
somewhat  too  monotonous,  his  speeches  were  always  pleasing; 
yet  he  did  not  ravish  your  senses  nor  carry  away  your  judg 
ment  by  storm.  His  was  of  the  mediate  class  of  eloquence 
described  by  Rollin  in  his  "  Belles  Lettres."  He  was  like  a 
beautiful  river  meandering  through  a  flowery  mead,  but  which 
never  overflowed  its  banks.  It  was  Henry  who  was  the 
mountain  torrent  that  swept  away  everything  before  it.  It  was 
he  alone  who  thundered  and  lightened.  He  alone  attained 
that  sublime  species  of  eloquence  also  mentioned  by  Rollin. 

It  has  been  one  of  the  greatest  pleasures  of  my  life  to  hear 
these  two  great  masters,  almost  constantly  opposed  to  each 
other,  for  several  sessions.  I  had  no  relish  for  any  other 
speaker.  Henry  was  almost  always  victorious.  He  was  as  much 
superior  to  Lee  in  temper  as  in  eloquence,  for  while  the 
former  would  often  apologize  to  the  House  for  being  so 
often  obliged  to  differ  from  the  latter,  which  he  assured  them 
was  from  no  want  of  respect  for  him,  I  once  heard  Mr.  Lee 
say  in  a  pet,  after  sustaining  a  great  defeat,  that  if  the  votes 
were  weighed  instead  of  being  counted,  he  would  not  have  lost 
it. 

Mr.  Henry  was  inferior  to  Mr.  Lee  in  the  gracefulness  of 
his  action,  and  perhaps  also  the  chasteness  of  his  language ; 
yet  his  language  was  seldom  incorrect,  and  his  address  always 
striking.  He  had  a  fine  blue  eye  and  an  earnest  manner  which 

443 


APPENDIX 

made  it  impossible  not  to  attend  to  him.  His  speaking  was 
unequal,  and  always  rose  with  the  subject  and  the  exigency. 
In  this  respect  he  entirely  differed  from  Mr.  Lee,  who  was 
always  equal.  At  some  times  Mr.  Henry  would  seem  to 
hobble  (especially  in  the  beginning  of  his  speeches),  and  at 
others  his  tones  would  be  almost  disagreeable;  yet  it  was  by 
means  of  his  tones  and  the  happy  modulation  of  his  voice  that 
his  speaking  had,  perhaps,  its  greatest  effect.  He  had,  a  happy 
articulation  and  a  clear,  distinct,  strong  voice,  and  every 
syllable  was  uttered.  He  was  very  unassuming  as  to  himself, 
amounting  almost  to  humility,  and  very  respectful  towards 
his  competitor ;  the  consequence  was  that  no  feeling  of  dis 
gust  or  animosity  was  arrayed  against  him.  His  exordiums  in 
particular  were  often  hobbling,  and  always  unassuming.  He 
knew  mankind  too  well  to  promise  much.  They  were  of  the 
"  menin  aeide "  cast  (of  Homer)  rather  than  of  the  "  fortu- 
nam  Priami  "  of  some  author  whose  name  is  forgotten. 

He  was  great  at  a  reply,  and  greater  in  proportion  to  the 
pressure  which  was  bearing  upon  him.  The  resources  of  his 
mind  and  of  his  eloquence  were  equal  to  any  drafts  which 
could  be  made  upon  them.  He  took  but  short  notes  of  what 
fell  from  his  adversaries,  and  disliked  the  drudgery  of  com 
position,  yet  it  is  a  mistake  to  say  he  could  not  write  well. 
Many  of  his  public  letters  prove  the  contrary.  I  do  not  know 
that  he  ever  wrote  anything  for  the  press. 

It  has  been  urged  against  Mr.  Henry  by  his  enemies,  and 
by  the  aristocrats  whom  he  overthrew,  that  he  always  seized 
and  advocated  the  popular  side  of  the  question.  Nothing  is 
less  true.  He  opposed  General  Washington  and  an  [illegible] 
world  (as  he  said)  on  the  subject  of  the  Constitution.  The 
man  who  would  do  this  cannot  be  suspected  of  want  of  firm 
ness  to  pursue  his  own  opinions.  The  man  who  moved  the 
Stamp  Act  resolutions,  and  took  up  arms  to  recover  the 
gunpowder,  pursued  his  own  course.  He  had  no  certain  indi 
cation  of  the  popular  opinion  in  either  case,  and  both  measures 
were  esteemed  by  ordinary  men  too  rash  and  bold  to  be 
popular.  Besides,  why  court  the  popular  opinion  when  he 
wanted  not  popularity,  for  he  had  resisted  (in  the  latter  part 
of  his  life)  every  distinction  which  was  offered  him? 

On  this  subject,  I  take  the  fact  to  be  that  he  generally  thought 
like  the  most  of  people,  because  he  was  a  plain,  practical 
man,  because  he  was  emphatically  one  of  the  people,  and  be 
cause  he  detested,  as  a  statesman,  the  projects  of  theorists 
and  bookworms.  His  prejudices  against  statesmen  of  this 

444 


APPENDIX 

character  were  very  strong.  He  emphatically  led  the  people  in 
promoting  and  effecting  the  Revolution. 

At  the  bar  Mr.  Henry  was  equally  successful.  When  I  saw 
him  there,  he  must  necessarily  have  been  very  rusty,  yet  I 
considered  him  a  good  lawyer.  He  was  acquainted  with  the 
rules  and  canons  of  property.  He  would  not,  indeed,  undergo 
the  drudgery  necessary  for  complicated  business,  yet  I  am 
told  that  in  the  British  Debt  Case  he  astonished  the  public 
not  less  by  the  matter  than  manner  of  his  speech.  It  was  as 
a  criminal  lawyer  that  his  eloquence  had  the  fairest  scope, 
and  in  that  character  I  have  seen  him.  He  was  perfect  master 
of  the  passions  of  his  auditory,  whether  in  the  tragic  or  the 
comic  line.  The  tones  of  his  voice,  to  say  nothing  of  his 
matter  and  gestures,  were  insinuated  into  the  feelings  of  his 
hearers  in  a  manner  that  baffled  all  description.  It  seemed  to 
operate  by  mere  sympathy,  and  by  his  tones  alone  it  seemed 
to  me  that  he  could  make  you  cry  or  laugh  at  pleasure;  yet 
his  gesture  came  powerfully  in  aid,  and  if  necessary  would 
approach  almost  to  the  ridiculous.  This  was  the  case  in  the 
"  roasting  case "  to  be  presently  mentioned.  So  in  Corbin's 
case.  ...  I  will  endeavor  to  give  some  account  of  his 
tragic  and  comic  effect  in  two  instances  that  came  before 
me. 

About  the  year  1792  one  Holland  killed  a  young  man  in 
Botetourt.  The  young  man  was  popular,  and  lived,  I  think, 
with  King,  a  merchant  in  Fincastle,  who  employed  John  Breck- 
enridge  to  assist  in  the  prosecution  of  Holland.  Holland  had 
gone  up  from  Louisa  as  a  schoolmaster,  but  had  turned  out 
badly,  and  was  very  unpopular.  The  killing  was  in  the  night, 
and  was  generally  believed  to  be  murder.  He  was  the  son 
of  one  Dr.  Holland,  who  was  yet  living  in  Louisa,  and  had 
been  one  of  Mr.  Henry's  juvenile  friends  and  acquaintances. 
At  the  instance  of  the  father,  and  for  a  reasonable  fee,  Mr. 
Henry  undertook  to  go  to  Greenbrier  Court  to  defend  Holland. 
Mr.  Winston  and  myself  were  the  judges.  Such  were  the 
prejudices  there,  as  I  was  afterward  informed  by  Thomas 
Madison,  that  the  people  declared  that  even  Patrick  Henry  need 
not  come  to  defend  Holland  unless  he  brought  a  jury  with  him. 

The  day  of  the  trial  the  Court  House  was  crowded,  and  I 
did  not  move  from  my  seat  for  14  hours,  and  had  no  wish  to 
do  so.  The  examination  took  up  a  great  part  of  the  time,  and 
the  lawyers  were  probably  exhausted.  Breckenridge  was  elo 
quent,  but  Henry  left  no  dry  eye  in  the  Court  House.  The 
case,  I  believe,  was  murder,  though  possibly  manslaughter  only, 

445 


APPENDIX 

and  Henry  laid  hold  of  this  possibility  with  such  effect  as 
to  make  all  forget  that  Holland  had  killed  the  storekeeper, 
and  presented  the  deplorable  case  of  the  jury  killing  Holland, 
an  innocent  man.  He  also  presented,  as  it  were  at  the  Clerk's 
table,  old  Holland  and  his  wife,  who  were  then  in  Louisa ; 
asked  what  must  be  the  feelings  of  this  venerable  pair  at  this 
awful  moment,  and  what  the  consequences  to  them  of  a  mis 
taken  verdict  affecting  the  life  of  their  son.  He  caused  the 
jury  to  lose  sight  of  the  murder  they  were  trying,  and  weep 
with  old  Holland  and  his  wife,  whom  he  painted,  and  perhaps 
proved  to  be,  very  respectable.  All  this  was  done  in  a  manner 
so  solemn  and  touching,  and  a  tone  so  irresistible,  that  it  was 
impossible  for  the  stoutest  heart  not  to  take  sides  with  the 
criminal.  During  the  examination  the  bloody  clothes  were 
brought  in.  Mr.  Henry  objected  to  their  exhibition,  and  ap 
plied  most  forcibly  and  pathetically  Antony's  remarks  on 
Caesar's  wounds ;  on  those  dumb  mouths  which  would  raise  the 
stones  of  Rome  to  mutiny.  He  urged  that  this  sight  would 
totally  deprive  the  jury  of  their  judgment,  which  would  be 
merged  in  their  feelings.  The  motion  fell,  Mr.  Winston  being 
of  opinion  to  reject  them;  I  was  of  opinion  to  receive  them  as 
explanatory  of  the  nature  of  the  crime,  by  showing  in  what 
direction  the  strokes  were  given. 

The  result  of  the  trial  was  that,  after  a  retirement  of  an 
half  or  a  quarter  of  an  hour,  the  jury  brought  in  a  verdict  of 
not  guilty!  But  on  being  reminded  by  the  Court  that  they 
might  find  an  inferior  degree  of  homicide,  they  then  brought 
in  a  verdict  of  manslaughter. 

Mr.  Henry  was  equally  successful  in  the  comic  line.  Mr. 
Wirt  has  heard,  no  doubt,  how  he  choused  John  Hook  out  of 
his  cause  by  raising  the  cry  of  "  Beef "  against  him.  I  will 
give  a  similar  instance.  About  the  year  1792  there  were  many 
suits  on  the  south  of  James  river  for  inflicting  Lynch  law.  A 
verdict  of  $500.  had  been  given  in  Prince  Edward  district 
court  in  a  case  of  this  kind.  This  alarmed  the  defendant  in 
the  next  case,  who  employed  Mr.  Henry  to  defend  him.  The 
case  was  that  a  waggoner  and  the  plaintiff  were  travelling  to 
Richmond,  and  the  waggoner  knocked  down  a  turkey  and  put  it 
into  his  waggon.  Complaint  was  made  to  the  defendant,  a 
justice;  both  the  parties  were  taken  up,  and  the  waggoner 
agreed  to  take  a  whipping  rather  than  be  sent  to  jail,  but  the 
plaintiff  refused.  The  justice,  however,  gave  him  also  a  small 
whipping,  and  for  this  the  suit  was  brought.  The  plaintiff's 
plea  was  that  he  was  wholly  innocent  of  the  act  committed. 

446 


APPENDIX 

Mr.  Henry,  on  the  contrary,  contended  that  he  was  a  party 
aiding  and  assisting.  In  the  course  of  his  remarks  he  thus 
expressed  himself:  "But,  gentlemen  of  the  jury,  this  plaintiff 
tells  you  that  he  had  nothing  to  do  with  the  turkey — I  dare 
say,  gentlemen,  not  until  it  was  roasted, "  etc.  He  pronounced 
the  word  roasted  with  such  rotundity  of  voice,  and  comicalness 
of  manner  and  gesture,  that  it  threw  every  one  into  a  fit  of 
laughter  at  the  plaintiff,  who  stood  up  in  the  place  usually 
allotted  to  criminals,  and  the  defendant  was  let  off  with  little 
or  no  damage. 

I  have  likened  this  faculty  of  Mr.  Henry  of  operating  upon 
the  feelings,  whether  tragic  or  comic,  by  the  mere  tone  of 
his  voice,  to  the  experiment  of  ringing  a  series  of  glasses  by 
rubbing  one  of  them  with  the  finger.  It  operated  by  sympathy. 
Yet  he  ranted  not,  nor  did  he  distress  himself  or  his  audience 
by  an  unnatural  stretching  of  his  throat.  He  had  a  perfect  com 
mand  of  a  strong  and  musical  voice,  which  he  raised  or  low 
ered  at  pleasure,  and  modulated  so  as  to  fall  in  with  any  given 
chord  of  the  human  heart. 

It  is  to  be  also  observed  that  although  his  language  was 
plain,  and  free  from  unusual  or  high-flown  words,  his  ideas 
were  remarkably  bold,  strong,  and  striking.  By  the  joint  effect 
of  these  two  faculties,  I  mean  of  the  power  of  his  tone  or  voice 
and  the  grandness  of  his  conceptions,  he  had  a  wonderful  effect 
upon  the  feelings  of  his  audience.  Both  of  these  concurred  in 
the  famous  speech  in  the  Convention  which  was  interrupted 
by  a  storm,  and  of  which  I  see  Mr.  Wirt  has  a  note.  The 
question  of  adoption  was  approaching,  and  from  that  cause 
every  one  had  an  awful  and  anxious  feeling.  This  was,  as  it 
were,  the  parting  speech  of  Mr.  Henry,  and  he  was  depicting 
the  awful  immensity  of  the  question  and  its  consequences 
as  it  respected  the  present  and  future  generations.  He  stated 
that  the  ethereal  beings  were  awaiting  with  anxiety  the  de 
cision  of  a  question  which  involved  the  happiness  or  misery  of 
more  than  half  the  human  race.  He  had  presented  such 
an  awful  picture,  and  in  such  feeling  colors,  as  to  interest 
the  feelings  of  the  audience  to  the  highest  pitch — when  lo !  a 
storm  at  that  moment  arose,  which  shook  the  building  in  which 
the  Convention  were  sitting,  and  broke  it  up  in  confusion.  So 
remarkable  a  coincidence  was  never  before  witnessed,  and  it 
seemed  as  if  he  had  indeed  the  faculty  of  calling  up  spirits  from 
the  vasty  deep. 

Mr.  Henry  was  remarkably  well  acquainted  with  mankind. 
He  knew  well  all  the  springs  and  motives  of  human  action. 

447 


APPENDIX 

This  faculty  arose  from  mingling  freely  with  mankind  and  from 
a  keen  and  constant  observation.  From  this  faculty,  and  his 
great  command  of  temper,  he  would  have  made  a  great  negoti 
ator.  In  fact,  he  was  a  great  negotiator,  for  in  managing  a 
jury  or  a  popular  assembly  he  measured  and  gauged  them  by 
a  discriminating  judgment.  He  knew  how  much  they  would 
bear,  and  what  was  the  proper  string  to  touch  them  upon. 
The  same  faculty  and  discernment  which  enabled  him  to  buy 
a  tract  of  land,  or  a  negro,  on  good  terms,  and  to  govern  a 
jury  or  a  popular  assembly  at  pleasure,  by  measuring  the  depth 
of  those  with  whom  he  was  dealing,  would  have  enabled  him 
to  fathom  the  views  and  feelings  of  Courts  and  Cabinets. 

The  advantage  of  Mr.  Henry's  education  consisted  in  this, 
that  it  arose  from  some  reading  which  he  never  forgot,  and 
much  observation  and  reflection.  It  was  remarked  of  Montes 
quieu's  "  Spirit  of  Laws "  that  it  was  a  good  book  for  one 
travelling  in  a  stage-coach,  for  that  you  might  read  as  much  of 
it  in  half  an  hour  as  would  serve  you  to  reflect  upon  a  whole 
day.  Such  was  somewhat  the  proportion  between  Mr.  Henry's 
education  as  drawn  from  reading  and  from  observation  and  re 
flection. 

He  read  good  books  as  it  were  for  a  text,  and  filled  up  the 
picture  by  an  acute  and  penetrating  observation  and  reflection 
and  by  mingling  in  the  society  of  men.  He  had  practised  law 
in  the  County  Courts :  a  school  remarkably  well  adapted  to 
acquaint  a  person  with  mankind  in  general. 

Mr.  Henry  was  very  fond  of  men  of  genius,  and  on  this 
ground  he  was  much  attached  to  Dr.  McClurg,  and  had  a  great 
agency  in  getting  him  into  the  Council  in  May,  1784.  Dr. 
McClurg,  I  believe,  would  not  have  been  then  elected  but  for 
a  speech  of  his  just  before  the  ballot.  As  he  spoke,  many 
members  were  seen  to  tear  up  their  ballots  prepared  for  other 
candidates.  Mr.  Henry  took  the  ground  for  Dr.  McClurg 
that  he  was  a  man  of  great  genius  and  eminence  in  his  pro 
fession.  At  this  time  party  had  not  thrown  our  citizens  so  far 
asunder. 

Mr.  Henry  did  not  permit  political  prejudices  to  tear  asunder 
his  friendships.  I  have  heard  that  he  interfered  with  the 
Committee  of  Hanover  in  favor  of  Mr.  Lyons,  an  old  friend 
and  fellow-practitioner  at  the  bar,  and  got  him  excused  when 
suspected  of  some  disaffection.  He  acted  a  very  friendly  and 
liberal  part  towards  Mr.  Ambler  when  Treasurer,  who  by 
some  means  sustained  a  considerable  loss  of  public  money,  and 
for  which  Ambler  was  grateful. 

448 


APPENDIX 

Mr.  Henry's  talent  for  humor  showed  itself  sometimes  in 
a  remarkable  manner.  About  the  year  1790,  as  I  think 
I  have  heard  him  or  some  of  the  family  say,  General  Lawson 
applied  to. him  for  his  friendly  advice  touching  the  state  of  his 
affairs,  which  were  deplorably  bad.  Lawson  had  been  a 
Revolutionary  patriot  and  soldier,  and  a  colleague  of  Mr. 
Henry  in  the  Assembly  and  Convention.  Mr.  Henry  secured 
a  full  and  frank  disclosure.  After  he  was  done,  H.  paused,  and 
Lawson  requested  his  opinion ;  on  which  Henry,  looking  at 
him  significantly,  said,  "  Why,  faith,  General,  you  had  better 
run  away."  This,  which  was  perhaps  a  jest  in  Henry,  was 
literally  followed  by  Lawson,  who  ran  to  Kentucky,  spent  his 
estate,  and  came  to  a  wretched  end. 

In  estimating  Mr.  Henry's  standing  and  endowments,  the 
difficulties  under  which  he  labored  ought  to  be  taken  into  con 
sideration.  He  was  without  a  regular  academical  education. 
He  was  poor,  married  young,  and  had  a  numerous  family.  For 
a  great  part  of  his  life  (tho'  he  died  rich)  he  was  struggling 
in  debt  and  difficulties.  Where  were  his  means  and  leisure 
for  improvement?  Contrast  him  in  these  respects  with  Madi 
son,  for  example.  Madison  was  born  to  affluence.  His  father 
early  gave  him  a  competent  fortune,  which  also,  I  believe,  he 
managed  for  him ;  and  Madison  lived  with  his  father,  I  believe, 
till  past  the  age  of  forty,  unincumbered  with  the  cares  of  a 
family  or  with  keeping  house.  He  had,  besides,  received  a 
finished  education  at  Princeton.  He  had  every  opportunity  for 
improvement,  and  his  life  was  that  of  a  recluse  and  student. 
Had  Mr.  Henry  had  these  advantages  and  been  as  studious  as 
Madison,  he  would  have  excelled  him,  if  possible,  as  much  in 
the  knowledge  of  books  as  he  actually  did  in  that  of  men :  the 
great  source  of  his  superiority  over  Madison  in  public  assem 
blies. 

It  has  been  said  of  Patrick  Henry  that  he  was  not  a  military 
man,  and  surmised  that  he  was  deficient  in  personal  courage. 
As  to  the  last,  he  was  so  good-tempered  a  man  that  I  never 
heard  of  his  having  a  quarrel.  He  did  indeed  call  on  Edm. 
Randolph  in  '88.  .  .  .  He  had,  however,  what  suited  us 
much  better :  an  astonishing  portion  of  political  courage.  Per 
haps  it  is  not  too  much  to  affirm  that  it  is  owing  to  this  one 
quality  of  this  single  man  that  our  revolution  took  place  at  the 
time  it  did.  As  to  his  being  a  military  man,  he  was  certainly 
not  a  man  of  system  and  regularity,  nor  do  I  believe  that  he 
was  a  good  tactician.  He  may  nevertheless  have  had  a  genius 
which  would  have  made  him  adequate  (with  the  aid  of  subal- 
29  449 


APPENDIX 

terns)  to  great  military  operations.  As  to  his  resigning  the 
command  of  the  first  regiment,  it  is  probable  that  he  may  have 
thought  himself  slighted  by  the  Committee  of  Safety,  tho' 
I  never  heard  him  complain  of  it.  Indeed,  he  seldom  com 
plained  (as  to  himself)  of  anybody.  That  committee,  however, 
had  a  spice  of  the  old  aristocracy  in  it,  by  whom  Henry  was 
much  hated,  and  it  might  have  been  agreeable  to  some  of  them 
to  mortify  him.  Pendleton,  the  eclipsed  rival  of  Henry,  pre 
sided  in  the  committee  and  had  his  party  with  him. 

The  principal  reason,  I  believe,  why  he  resigned  was  that 
he  was  called  for  by  the  public  voice  as  Governor,  and  was 
perhaps  indispensably  necessary  in  that  station.  His  competitor 
for  that  office  was  Secretary  Nelson,  who  was  beaten  easily  by 
Patrick  Henry,  although  supported  by  all  the  aristocracy,  and 
by  Pendleton  and  perhaps  a  few  others  of  plebeian  standing. 

Henry  had  strong  prejudices  for  and  against  many  of  his 
political  associates,  though  he  only  expressed  them  to  his 
particular  friends.  He  had  the  highest  opinion  of  George 
Mason's  talents,  patriotism,  and  republican  principles.  He 
considered  him  as  a  man  well  acquainted  with  the  interests  of 
the  people  and  warmly  attached  to  the  liberty  of  his  country. 
A  cordial  friendship  existed  between  them.  Of  R.  H.  Lee 
he  did  not  think  quite  so  well,  and  they  were  very  often 
opposed  to  each  other ;  yet  they  coalesced  on  great  questions, 
as  that  of  independence,  and  opposition  to  the  federal  constitu 
tion.  In  '88  Mr.  Henry  nominated  Lee  and  Gray  son  as  Sena 
tors  (taking  the  unusual  liberty  of  nominating  two)  against 
Madison,  and  they  were  elected.  He  was  very  fond  of  John 
Tyler,  as  a  warm  hearted  patriot  and  an  honest,  sensible  man, 
and  many  others  not  necessary  to  be  now  mentioned.  As 
to  Mr.  Madison,  he  considered  him  in  '83  and  '4  as  a  man  of 
great  acquirements,  but  too  theoretical  as  a  politician,  and  that 
he  was  not  well  versed  in  the  affairs  of  men.  This  opinion 
increased  in  the  Convention  of  '88 ;  he  was  astonished  that 
Madison  would  take  the  Constitution,  admitting  its  defects, 
and  in  a  season  of  perfect  peace,  and  believed  him  too  friendly 
to  a  strong  government  and  too  hostile  to  the  Governments 
of  the  States.  On  these  grounds  he  was  rejected  as  a  Sena 
tor  in  '88;  and  probably  this  rejection  was  useful  to  Madison, 
for,  to  regain  the  confidence  of  his  native  State,  he  brought 
forward  the  amendments  introduced  in  '89  into  the  Constitu 
tion. 

Henry's  prejudice  against  Madison  always  remained  in  some 
degree,  and  to  this  cause  may  in  some  measure  be  ascribed 

450 


APPENDIX 

his  alleged  secession  from  the  Republican  party,  now  headed 
by  Madison,  toward  the  close  of  his  life.  With  respect  to 
this  alleged  change  of  his  political  principles,  I  shall  say  what 
I  know  about  it.  When  I  was  last  with  him,  in  October,  '94, 
there  was  no  difference  between  his  opinions  and  mine  that  I 
could  discover.  I  was  extremely  well  pleased  with  all  his 
opinions,  which  he  communicated  freely.  He  had,  after  the 
adoption  of  the  Constitution,  taken  the  anti-federal  side  in  the 
Assembly  on  all  occasions.  After  this,  matters  seeming  to 
come  to  extremities  in  relation  to  our  foreign  affairs,  I  under 
stood,  for  I  never  again  saw  him,  that  he  disapproved  the  policy 
of  embarking  in  the  cause  of  France  and  running  the  risk  of 
a  war  with  Britain.  Possibly  his  sagacious  mind  foresaw  the 
issue  of  the  French  Revolution,  and  dreaded  the  effect  of  a  war 
with  England  upon  our  free  government,  and  upon  the  finances 
of  the  United  States. 

After  it  began  to  be  rumored  that  he  had  changed  his 
opinions,  he  wrote  me  several  letters  alluding  to  the  report, 
and  averring  that  his  opinions  were  not  changed,  and  that  he 
was  too  old  to  change  them,  but  admitting  that  he  differed  from 
the  Republican  leaders  as  to  some  of  their  measures,  which 
he  considered  unwise  and  impolitic.  I  saw  another  long  letter 
to  one  of  his  daughters,  who  had  apprised  him  that  he  was 
charged  with  a  change  of  his  opinions,  entirely  to  the  same 
effect.  According  to  the  best  of  my  recollection,  this  letter 
had  some  cant  of  religious  professions,  and  complaint  of  the 
decay  of  virtue,  &c.,  which  I  rather  think  indicated  a  change 
in  him,  and  some  debility  or  gloom  in  his  understanding.  The 
particular  date  of  it  is  not  recollected,  but  I  rather  think  it  was 
within  the  two  years  in  which  Judge  Winston  says  he  gradually 
declined  before  his  death.  The  alleged  change  must,  I  presume, 
have  been  subsequent  to  the  fall  of  '96,  for  in  that  session  he 
was  elected  Governor  for  the  third  time,  with  a  view  to  keep 
out  General  Wood,  who  was  deemed  a  Federalist.  Mr.  Henry 
was  voted  for  zealously  by  all  the  Republicans ;  he  declined, 
however,  and  Wood  was  then  elected. 

It  must  have  been  about  the  same  time  that  he  was  chosen 
a  Senator  of  the  United  States,  which  I  see  is  asserted  in 
one  of  the  statements  furnished,  tho'  I  have  at  present  no  dis 
tinct  recollection  of  that  fact  (quere  de  hoc).  I  have  under 
stood  that  for  two  or  three  years  before  he  died  he  became 
much  debilitated.  ...  He  was  very  retired,  and  much  out 
of  the  way  of  correct  information.  I  have  also  understood  that 
he  became  then  more  religious,  and  that  it  became  a  frequent 

451 


APPENDIX 

topic  of  his  conversation.  This  I  must  ascribe  to  the  debility 
just  mentioned;  for  tho'  I  believe  him  to  have  been  always  a 
Christian,  he  was  remarkably  tolerant  to  others,  and  never 
obtruded  that  as  the  subject  of  conversation.  In  this  state  of 
seclusion  and  debility,  he  was  a  fit  subject  to  be  worked  upon 
by  artful  politicians,  to  widen  a  breach  which  would  not  other 
wise  have  been  so  great.  That  debility  which,  in  the  instance 
of  the  Will  before  mentioned,  made  him  an  easy  prey  to 
intrigues  of  a  domestic  character,  laid  him  equally  open  to 
the  arts  of  crafty  politicians. 

Before  this  time  General  Washington,  no  doubt  informed 
of  some  difference  in  opinion  between  him  and  the  Republi 
can  leaders,  wrote  him  flattering  letters.  He  had  appointed 
him  Secretary  of  State,  and  he  and  Mr.  Adams  appointed 
him  one  of  a  trio  of  ambassadors  to  go  to  France,  or  England, 
and  also  a  Minister  to  the  Court  of  Spain;  all  of  which 
appointments  Mr.  Henry  declined.  I  do  not  think  that  at 
the  time  these  appointments  were  offered  Mr.  Henry  was  in 
this  state  of  debility;  nor  do  I  assert  anything  about  this 
debility  but  from  information  and  belief.  I  have  no  personal 
knowledge  of  it*  They  were,  however,  offered  after  Patrick- 
Henry  began  to  diverge  from  the  Republican  party,  and  meas 
ures  were  afterward  taken  to  widen  the  breach  and  to  inflame 
him  against  the  Republican  leaders. 

As  to  these  measures,  Henry  Lee  was  the  principal  agent. 
He  misrepresented  the  views  and  conduct  of  the  Republicans, 
and  flattered  Mr.  Henry,  and  assailed  him  on  his  weak  side, 
in  the  trading  for  valuable  lands  which  Mr.  H.  wished  to 
acquire  for  the  sons  of  his  second  marriage.  By  means  like 
this  I  believe  it  was  that  Lee  got  from  him  a  political  letter, 
which  he  used  to  the  injury  of  the  Republican  cause  in  a 
contested  election  in  the  Northern  Neck. 

I  well  remember  that  when  I  visited  Mrs.  Henry,  on  her 
invitation,  after  Mr.  Henry's  death,  I  mentioned  this  fact 
to  her,  and  stated  the  injury  it  had  done  to  Mr.  Henry  with 
the  Republicans.  She  seemed  to  agree  with  me  on  the 
subject,  but  concluded,  with  a  laugh,  that  Henry  Lee  had  been 
a  great  friend  to  their  family,  for  that  Mr.  Henry  had  got  two 

*  Roane's  ardent  Republicanism  should  be  kept  in  mind  while 
one  is  reading  his  passages  on  Henry's  political  course  during 
this  period.  Jefferson  planned  to  put  Roane  in  line  for  the 
Presidency.  The  idea  was  to  run  Crawford  for  President  and 
Roane  for  Vice- President,  and  then  to  advance  Roane. 

452 


APPENDIX 

fine  tracts  of  land  from  him!  This  was  the  instrument  by 
which  the  influence  of  this  infirm  and  declining  old  man  was 
to  be  drawn  from  the  Republican  cause;  this  was  the  panacea 
for  every  injury.  It  must  have  been  by  similar  means  that 
a  letter  was  got  from  Mr.  Henry  favoring  Marshall  in  his 
election  contest  with  Clopton.  It  was  written  to  a  man 
(Arch'd  Blair)  who,  I  well  know,  was  hardly  in  the  habit 
of  conversing  with  Mr.  Henry  in  his  more  prosperous  days. 
On  the  whole,  it  is  my  decided  opinion  and  belief  (but  I 
only  give  it  as  my  opinion  and  belief)  that  Mr.  Henry  was 
operated  upon  by  the  artfulness  and  misrepresentation  of 
artful  and  designing  men,  under  circumstances  of  seclusion 
and  debility  arising  from  the  infirmity  of  age  and  disease 
peculiarly  fitting  him  for  the  operation;  and  that  by  this 
means  he  was  carried  to  greater  lengths  against  the  measures 
of  the  Republicans  than  he  would  otherwise  have  gone. 

The  effect  now  supposed  can  only  be  ascribed  to  debility. 
Formerly  no  man  was  more  armed  against  seductions  of  every 
kind  than  Patrick  Henry.  Offices  had  now  no  charm  for 
him,  for  he  declined  them  all  before  the  time  in  question,  and 
he  was  hackneyed  through  life  to  flattery  and  compliments. 
As  a  proof  how  impenetrable  he  had  been  to  attempts  of  this 
kind,  when  Leven  Rowell  and  Chas.  Simons  and  others 
professed  a  willingness  to  vote  for  him  as  President,  but 
not  for  Jefferson,  he  declined  the  thing  by  a  short  notification 
in  the  Gazette.  If,  therefore,  he  was  operated  upon,  as  I 
have  supposed,  it  must  be  ascribed  to  debility,  and  to  it 
only.  Under  other  circumstances  he  could  have  got  Lee's 
land  without  any  sacrifice  of  opinion,  for  he  was  a  match  for 
Lee  in  bargaining. 

Mr.  Winston  says  Mr.  Henry  died  in  June,  1799,  after  "  a 
gradual  decline  of  about  two  years."  I  suspect  it  will  be 
found  that  his  most  violent  complaints  against  the  Republicans 
took  place  within  those  two  years.  This  decline  was  not, 
perhaps,  attended  with  effects  palpably  visible,  for  he  was 
elected  for  Charlotte  in  April,  '99 ;  but  it  made  him  gloomy 
on  the  subject  of  religion,  and  querulous  on  that  of  politics. 
In  short,  I  believe  it  made  him  a  different  man  from  what  he 
had  before  been.  At  the  same  time,  I  readily  admit  that 
he  had  before  differed  from  the  Republicans  in  some  degree 
as  to  measures  of  policy,  in  some  instances ;  in  some  of 
which,  perhaps,  time  has  shown  that  he  was  not  mistaken.  As 
to  fundamentals,  however,  I  must  always  believe  'he  remained 
a  true  and  genuine  Republican. 

453 


APPENDIX 

In  giving  this  sketch  of  what  I  knew  of  Mr.  Henry,  I 
have  endeavored  to  be  faithful.  It  will  be  seen  whether  a 
spirit  of  candor  does  not  run  through  the  relation,  and  how 
far  it  is  corroborated  by  other  accounts.  It  was  my  intention 
"nothing  to  extenuate,  nor  set  down  aught  in  malice."  If  my 
descriptions  seem  extravagant,  let  it  be  remembered  that  he 
was  a  most  remarkable  man.  As  for  his  public  conduct  and 
opinions,  they  are  already  before  the  world,  who  will  judge  of 
them.  It  is  only  his  eloquence,  character,  and  virtue  to  which 
my  details  have  related.  In  forming  an  estimate  of  his  elo 
quence,  no  reliance  can  be  placed  on  the  printed  speeches. 
No  reporter  whatever  could  take  down  what  he  actually  said ; 
and,  if  he  could,  it  would  fall  far  short  of  the  original.  Much 
of  the  effect  of  his  eloquence  arose  from  his  voice,  gesture, 
etc.,  which  in  print  is  entirely  lost. 

As  to  the  character  of  Mr.  Henry :  with  many  sublime  virtues, 
he  had  no  vice  that  I  knew  or  ever  heard  of,  and  scarcely  a 
foible.  I  have  thought,  indeed,  that  he  was  too  much  attached 
to  property :  a  defect,  however,  which  might  be  excused  on  the 
largeness  of  a  beloved  family,  and  the  straitened  circumstances 
in  which  he  had  been  confined  during  a  great  part  of  his 
life. 

Mr.  Henry  was  a  man  of  middling  stature.  He  was  rather 
stoop-shouldered  (after  I  knew  him),  probably  the  effect  of 
age.  He  had  no  superfluous  flesh ;  his  features  were  distinctly 
marked,  and  his  complexion  rather  dark.  He  was  somewhat 
bald,  and  always  wore  a  wig  in  public.  He  was,  according 
to  my  recollection,  very  attentive  to  his  teeth,  his  beard,  and 
his  linen.  He  was  not  a  handsome  man,  but  his  countenance 
was  agreeable,  and  full  of  intelligence  and  interest.  He  had 
a  fine  blue  eye,  and  an  excellent  set  of  teeth,  which,  with  the 
aid  of  a  mouth  sufficiently  wide,  enabled  him  to  articulate 
very  distinctly.  His  voice  was  strong,  harmonious,  and  clear, 
and  he  could  modulate  it  at  pleasure. 

The  miniature  shown  by  Mr.  Wirt  has  some  resemblance  of 
Mr.  Henry,  but  is  not  a  good  likeness.  It  makes  him  too 
thin  and  wrinkled,  and  to  appear  older  than  he  appeared 
when  I  last  saw  him.  I  saw  that  miniature  about  the  time 
it  was  taken,  and  gave  this  opinion  then.  The  portrait  I 
mentioned  to  Mr.  Wirt,  if  in  existence,  affords  a  better 
likeness. 


454 


Appendix  C 

PATRICK  HENRY'S  WILL 

IN  THE  NAME  OF  GOD,  AMEN  : — I,  Patrick  Henry,  of  Char 
lotte  County,  at  my  leisure  and  in  my  health  do  make  this  my 
last  Will  and  Testament  in  manner  following,  and  do  write  it 
throughout  with  my  own  hand.  I,  knowing  my  ever  dear  wife 
Dorethea  to  be  worthy  of  the  most  full  and  entire  confidence,  I 
do  will  and  devise  to  her  the  Guardianship  of  my  children,  and 
do  direct  and  order  that  she  shall  not  in  any  manner  be  ac 
countable  to  any  person  for  her  management  therein.  I  do  give 
to  my  said  wife  Dorethea  all  my  Lands  at  and  adjoining  my 
dwelling  place  called  Red-hill,  purchased  from  Fuqua,  Booker, 
Watkins,  &  others,  out  of  the  tract  called  Watkins's  order,  to 
hold  during  her  life,  together  with  twenty  of  my  slaves, 
her  choice  of  them  all,  and  at  her  death  the  said  Lands  are 
to  be  equally  divided  in  value  in  fee  simple  between  two  of 
my  sons  by  her ;  and  she  is  to  name  and  point  out  the  two 
Sons  that  are  to  take  the  said  Lands  in  fee  simple  at  her  dis 
cretion.  I  will  and  direct  all  my  Lands  in  my  Long  Island 
estate  in  Campbell  County  to  be  divided  into  two  parts  by 
Randolph's  old  road,  till  you  come  along  it  to  the  place  where 
the  new  road  going  from  the  Overseer's  house  to  Davis's  mill 
crosses  it  at  two  white  oaks  and  the  stump  of  a  third,  from 
thence  by  a  straight  line  a  few  hundred  yards  to  Potts's  Spring 
at  the  old  Quarter  place,  from  thence  as  the  water  runs  to  the 
river  which  is  near  to  the  upper  part  where  Mr.  Philip  Payne 
lives  is  to  be  added  the  Long  Island  and  other  Islands, 
to  the  lower  part  the  Overseer's  residence  and  also  one  hun 
dred  and  fifty  acres  of  the  back  land  out  of  the  upper  part 
most  convenient  for  both  parts  for  Timbers  to  the  lower. 
These  two  estates  to  be  [in]  fee  simple  to  two  of  my  other  sons 
by  my  said  wife,  whom  she  is  also  to  name  and  point  out. 
I  will  and  direct  that  there  be  raised  towards  paying  my 
debts  one  thousand  pounds  by  sale  in  fee  simple,  out  of 
my  following  Lands,  viz. — Leatherwood,  Prince  Edward  Lands, 
Kentucky  Lands,  Seven  Island  Lands,  and  those  lately  pur 
chased  of  Marshall  Mason,  Nowell,  Wimbush,  Massy,  and 
Prewett,  or  such  parts  thereof  as  my  Executors  may  direct, 
and  the  residue  thereof  I  will  and  direct  to  be  allotted  equally 

455 


APPENDIX 

in  value  into  two  parts  for  a  provision  for  other  two  of  my  sons 
in  fee  simple  by  my  said  wife,  which  sons  she  shall  in  like 
manner  name  and  point  out.  But  if  the  payment  of  my 
debts  is  or  can  be  accomplished  without  selling  any  of  my 
slaves  or  personal  estate,  then  I  desire  none  of  these  Lands  to 
be  sold,  but  they  are  to  be  allotted  as  the  provision  aforesaid 
for  two  of  my  sons.  Thus  I  have  endeavored  to  provide  for 
my  six  sons  by  my  dear  Dorethea ;  their  names  are  Patrick, 
Fayette,  Alexander  Spotswood,  Nathaniel,  Edward  Winston, 
and  John.  I  will  my  slaves  to  be  equally  divided  amongst  my 
children  by  my  present  wife  except  my  daughter  Winston,  who 
has  received  hers,  or  nearly  so;  but  the  twenty  slaves  given  to 
my  said  wife  for  her  life,  I  desire  she  may  give  as  she  pleases 
amongst  her  children  by  me.  I  will  that  my  wife  have  power 
to  execute  Deeds  for  any  Lands  I  have  agreed  to  sell,  in  the 
most  ample  manner.  I  give  to  my  Grandson  Edmund  Henry, 
when  he  arrives  to  the  age  of  twenty  one  years  and  not  before, 
in  fee  simple,  the  thousand  acres  of  Land  where  his  father 
died,  joining  Perego's  line,  Cole's  line,  and  the  line  of  the 
land  intended  for  my  son  Edward,  dec'd.,  together  with  the 
negroes  and  other  property  on  the  said  one  thousand  acres 
of  Land.  But  in  case  the  said  Edmund  shall  die  under  the 
age  of  twenty  one  years,  and  without  Issue  then  alive,  I  will 
the  said  Land,  Slaves,  and  other  property  to  my  six  sons  above 
mentioned  equally  in  fee  simple.  I  have  heretofore  provided 
for  the  children  of  my  first  marriage,  but  I  will  to  my  daughters, 
Roane  and  Aylett,  two  hundred  pounds  each  of  them  as  soon 
as  my  estate  can  conveniently  pay  it  by  cropping.  In  case 
either  of  my  six  sons,  viz. — Patrick,  Fayette,  Alexander  Spots- 
wood,  Nathaniel,  Edward  Winston,  or  John,  shall  die  under 
the  age  of  twenty  one,  unmarried  and  without  Issue  then  living, 
I  will  that  the  estate  of  such  decedent  be  divided  among  the 
Survivors  of  them  in  such  manner  as  my  said  wife  shall  direct. 
All  the  rest  and  residue  of  my  estate,  whether  Lands, 
Slaves,  personal  estate,  Debts  and  rights  of  every  kind,  I  give 
to  my  ever  dear  and  beloved  wife  Dorethea,  the  better  to 
enable  her  to  educate  and  bring  up  my  Children  by  her,  and 
in  particular  I  desire  she  may  at  her  discretion  collect,  ac 
commodate,  manage,  and  dispose  of  the  debt  due  to  me  from 
the  late  Judge  Wilson  in  such  manner  as  she  thinks  best, 
without  being  accountable  to  any  person,  but  so  as  that  the 
produce,  whether  in  Lands,  Slaves,  or  other  effects,  be  by 
her  given  amongst  her  children  by  me,  as  I  do  hereby  direct 
all  the  said  residue  to  be  given  by  her  after  her  decease.  If 

456 


APPENDIX 

the  said  debt  from  the  said  Wilson  can  not  be  recovered,  then 
I  give  the  Lands  I  covenanted  to  sell  to  him,  the  said  Wilson, 
lying  in  Virginia  and  North  Carolina,  to  my  said  wife  in  fee 
simple  to  make  the  most  of  and  apply  for  the  benefit  of  her 
children  by  me  as  aforesaid.  But  in  case  my  said  wife  shall 
marry  again,  in  that  case  I  revoke  and  make  void  every  gift, 
legacy,  authority,  or  power  herein  mentioned,  and  order,  will, 
and  direct,  She,  my  said  wife,  shall  have  no  more  of  my  estate 
than  she  can  recover  by  Law ;  nor  shall  she  be  Guardian  to  any 
of  my  children,  or  Executrix  of  this  my  Will.* 

I  will  that  my  daughters,  Dorethea  S.  Winston,  M.  Catha 
rine  Henry,  and  Sarah  Butler  Henry,  be  made  equal  in  their 
negroes.  In  case  the  debt  from  Judge  Wilson's  estate  be  re 
covered,  I  do  desire  and  will  that  five  hundred  dollars  each  be 
paid  to  my  dear  Daughters,  Anne  Roane  &  Elizabeth  Aylett, 
and  Martha  Fontaine. 

This  is  all  the  inheritance  I  can  give  to  my  dear  family.  The 
religion  of  Christ  can  give  them  one  which  will  make  them 
rich  indeed. 

I  appoint  my  dear  wife  Dorethea  Executrix,  my  friends 
Edmund  Winston,  Philip  Payne,  and  George  D.  Winston  Exec 
utors,  of  this  my  last  Will,  revoking  all  others.  In  witness 
whereof  I  have  hereunto  set  my  hand  and  seal  this  20th  No 
vember,  1798. 

P.  HENRY,  L.  S. 

Codicil  to  my  Will,  written  by  myself  throughout,  and  by 
me  annexed  and  added  to  the  said  Will  and  made  part  thereof 
in  manner  following,  that  is  to  say :  Whereas,  since  the  making 
[of]  my  said  Will,  I  have  covenanted  to  sell  my  Lands  on 
Leatherwood  to  George  Hairston,  including  the  1000  acres 
intended  for  my  Grandson  Edmund  Henry,  and  have  agreed 
to  purchase  from  General  Henry  Lee  two  shares  of  the  Saura 
Town  Lands,  amounting  to  about  6,314  acres  certain,  and  the 
debt  due  me  from  Wilson's  estate  is  agreed  to  go  in  payment 
for  the  said  purchase,  whereby  there  will  exist  no  necessity 
to  sell  any  of  my  estate  for  payment  of  my  debts,  I  do  there- 

*  But  Widow  Dorothea  did  as  she  pleased.  She  married 
Judge  Edmund  Winston,  Patrick  Henry's  cousin.  That  liti 
gation  followed  is  shown  in  Judge  Roane's  Memorandum. 
Court  commissioners  arranged  a  division  of  the  various  tracts 
of  land.  Colonel  John  Henry's  letters  to  Wirt  contain  affec 
tionate  references  to  his  aging  mother,  who  elected  to  go  to 
her  grave,  not  as  a  Winston,  but  as  a  Henry. 

457 


APPENDIX 

fore  give  the  said  Saura  Town  Lands  in  fee  simple  equally  to 
be  divided  in  value  to  two  of  my  sons  by  my  dear  wife 
Dorethea,  and  desire  her  to  name  the  sons  who  are  to  take 
that  estate,  and  it  is  to  be  in  Lieu  and  place  of  the  Leather- 
wood,  Prince  Edward,  Kentucky,  and  Seven  Islands,  and  other 
lands  allotted  for  two  of  my  sons  in  my  said  Will,  so  that 
the  Red-hill  estate,  Long  Island  estate,  and  the  Saura  Town 
estate  will  furnish  seats  for  my  six  sons  by  my  wife. 

In  case  any  part  of  my  Lands  be  evicted  or  lost  for  want  of 
title,  I  will  that  a  contribution  of  my  other  sons  make  good 
such  loss  in  Lands  of  equal  value. 

I  give  to  my  Daughter  Fontaine  five  hundred  dollars;  to 
each  of  my  Daughters,  Anne  Roane  and  Elizabeth  Aylett,  one 
thousand  dollars;  to  my  daughter  Dorethea  S.  Winston,  one 
thousand  dollars,  as  soon  as  my  estate  can  conveniently  raise 
these  sums.  To  my  Daughters,  Martha  Catharine  and  Sarah 
Butler,  I  give  one  thousand  pounds  each,  and  these  legacies  to 
all  and  each  of  my  daughters  are  to  be  in  Lieu  and  place  of 
everything  before  intended  for  them,  and  if  it  is  not  in  the 
power  of  my  Executors  to  pay  my  said  Daughters  their 
legacies  in  money  from  my  estate,  then  and  in  that  case  all 
my  said  Daughters  are  to  take  property,  real  or  personal,  at  fair 
valuation,  for  their  legacies  respectively.  And  to  this  end  I 
give  my  Lands  in  Kentucky,  Prince  Edward,  at  the  Seven 
Islands,  all  my  Lands  lately  purchased  near  Falling  River  and 
its  waters,  containing  about  17  or  1800  acres,  and  all  others  not 
mentioned  herein,  to  my  Executors  for  the  aforesaid  purpose  of 
paying  Legacies  and  for  allowing  my  Grandson  Edmund  Henry 
eight  hundred  pounds  in  Lieu  of  the  Leatherwood  Lands  in 
case  he  shall  attain  the  age  of  twenty  one  years  or  marries, 
but  not  otherwise.  His  Land,  if  he  has  it  at  all,  is  to  be  in 
fee  simple,  as  also  all  the  Lands  that  may  be  allotted  in  Lieu 
of  money  are  to  go  in  fee  simple. 

I  also  will  that  my  said  Dear  wife  shall  at  her  discretion  dis 
pose  of  three  hundred  pounds  worth  of  the  said  last  mentioned 
Lands  to  any  of  her  children  by  me,  and  finally  of  whatsoever 
residue  there  may  happen  to  be  after  satisfying  the  foregoing 
demands,  and  that  she  shall  have  in  fee  simple  all  the  residue 
of  my  estate,  real  or  personal,  not  disposed  of  for  the  intent 
and  purpose  of  giving  the  same  amongst  her  children  by  me. 
If  she  chooses  to  set  free  one  or  two  of  my  slaves,  she  is  to 
have  full  power  to  do  so.  In  case  Judge  Wilson's  debt  is  lost  by 
General  Lee  not  taking  it  in  payment,  whereby  the  contract 
for  Saura  Town  Lands  becomes  void,  this  Codicil  is  to  become 

458 


APPENDIX 

of  no  effect,  and  is  to  be  void  and  null,  and  my  Executors 
are  to  compensate  the  two  of  my  sons  to  whom  my  Leather- 
wood  Lands  were  to  go,  by  the  Lands  sold  to  Judge  Wilson, 
and  they  are  in  that  case  to  have  all  the  Lands  directed  to  be 
joined  with  the  Leather  wood,  and  so  much  money  as  will  make 
their  Lotts  equal  in  value  with  the  Lotts  of  my  other  sons  by 
my  present  wife. 

In  witness  whereof  I  have  hereunto  set  my  hand  and  seal 
this  I2th  day  of  February,  1799. 

P.  HENRY,  L.  S. 

Indorsements:  The  within  is  my  Will  written  throughout 
by  my  own  hand  this  2Oth  November,  1798. 

P.  HENRY. 

The  Codicil  also  written  by  myself,  February  i2th,  1799. 

P.  HENRY. 

At  a  Court  held  for  Charlotte  County  the  ist  day  of  July, 
1799,  this  last  Will  and  Testament  of  Patrick  Henry,  Esquire, 
dec'd.,  with  the  Codicil  hereto  annexed,  was  presented  in 
Court  by  Edmund  Winston,  Gentleman,  one  of  the  Executors 
herein  named,  and  there  being  no  witness  to  the  said  Will  or 
Codicil,  Paul  Carrington,  Sen'r.,  and  Paul  Carrington,  Jun'r., 
Gentlemen,  being  sworn,  each  deposed  that  they  are  well  ac 
quainted  with  the  Testator's  hand  writing,  and  verily  believes 
that  the  said  Will  and  the  Codicil  annexed,  and  the  name  there 
to  subscribed,  are  all  of  the  Testator's  hand  writing ;  whereupon 
the  said  Will  and  Codicil  are  ordered  to  be  recorded.  On  the 
motion  of  Dorethea  Henry,  the  Executrix,  and  the  said  Ed 
mund  Winston  and  George  D.  Winston,  two  of  the  Executors 
therein  named,  who  made  oath  according  to  Law,  certificate  is 
granted  them  for  obtaining  a  probate  of  the  said  Will  in  due 
form,  they  giving  security.  Whereupon  they  with  Joel  Watkins, 
Paul  Carrington,  Jun'r.,  and  Philip  Payne,  their  securities, 
entered  into  and  acknowledged  their  bond  according  to  Law  for 
that  purpose,  reserving  liberty  to  Philip  Payne,  the  other 
Executor  named  in  the  Will,  to  join  in  the  probate  thereof  when 
he  shall  think  fit. 

Teste,  THOMAS  READ,  Cle. 
A  true  copy. 

THOMAS  READ,  Cler. 


459 


Appends  j^ 

VERBATIM  COPY  OF  INVENTORY  & 

OF  ESTATE  OF  PATRICK  HENR\PRTAISEMENT 

COUNTY  OF  CHARLOTTE  ?  THE 

a/c  Judge  Roane.  Roane  vs.  Henry— CA 

In  obedience  to  an  order  of  Charlotte  Court  to  us  directed, 

we,  being  duly  sworn,  have  appraised  the  estate  of  Col.  Patrick 

Henry,   dec'd.,   in   current  money  this  day  of  July,    1799. 

This  estate  in  the  County  of  Charlotte. 

i      negro   man   Jessee,    £200. 

i       ditto  ditto  John,   100. 

i       ditto  woman,  Pegg  &  her  children, 

Shadrack,  Nancy,  Pleasant,  Jessee, 

Reuben  and  Letty,  300. 

Dafney  &  her  children,  Tim    (a)   &  Ned,  165. 

(a)  valued  by  consent  at  £40. 

Milley  and  her  child  Joe, 100. 

Critty  &  her  3  children,  Jack, 

Harrison  &  Coleman, 150. 

Girl,   Tyree,    35. 

ditto   Salley,    35. 

ditto  Anny,    75. 

Alee,  a  young  wench,    100. 

Dinah,  an  old  woman,   40. 

Ceasar,  a  young  fellow,   100. 

Peter,  a  negro  man,  50. 

Bobb,  a  negro  man,  120. 

Tom,  a  negro  man, 120. 

Scotchman,  a  negro  man, 120. 

Cato,  a  negro  man, 120. 

Joe,  a  negro  man,  100. 

Ciseley,  a  negro  woman,   90. 

Daniel,  a  negro  man,  120. 

Isaac,  a  negro  man,  120. 

Doctor,  a  negro  man, 10. 

Ben,  a  lad,   70. 

461 


APPENDIX 

Fox,  a  lad, T00 

Nel  &  her  child  Billey, ' 

Little  Gate,  a  girl,   •  6a 

Ben  jr.,  a  boy,  '  ^ 

Little  Daniel,  do.   . .  6o' 

John  jr.,  a  boy,  .;"""'..!!!..!!!!'..'.!!  60! 
Sam,  a  boythijdreil)'  Robm> 

Beck  &o  l^nd  Dinah, 130. 

^  .,P&  her  children,  Phill, 

'  Sally,  Abby,  Gib  &  Squire, 185. 

'oily  &  her  children,   Abraham, 

Presey,  Polly  and  Dicy,    135. 

Annekey   &   her   children,   Vilet, 

Fanny,  Zebulon  &  Lewis,   175. 

Cager,  a  negro  man,    175. 

Reubin,  a  negro  man, 175. 

Solomon,  a  lad,    70. 

Aggy,  a  child, 3. 

i       old  bay  mare   &  colt    20. 

i       bay  horse,    35. 

bay  horse,    40. 

bay  horse,    36. 

bay  horse,   33. 

gray  mare  filley,   20. 

bay  mare  &  colt,  27.10 

bay  mare  filley,   40. 

gray  horse   colt,    20. 

dark  bay  horse,  25. 

bright  bay  horse,  25. 

old  Rone   horse, 5. 

bay  mare, 30. 

gray    horse,    20. 

dark  bay  do 30. 

old  sorrel  do 3. 

dark  bay  horse,  20. 

sorrel    horse,    18. 

bay  ditto    25. 

black    do 10. 

1 1     work  steers,    82.10 

156  head  of  cattle  of  every  description,...  338. 

155  hogs  of  every  kind,   107.5 

60    head  of  sheep,  30. 

462 


APPENDIX 

9  axes,    2.12.6 

35  hoes,    7.12 

i  chariot  &  harness  for  4  horses, 100. 

I  ride'g  chair  &  harness,  18. 

3  mens  saddles  &  bridles,  7.12 

1  womans    do.         do 6. 

3  ox  carts,    9.12 

2  Lock  chains,  .18 

13  plows,  hoes  &  gair,  11.16 

3  hand  saws,   i.io 

i  f  row, .2.6 

4  chisels  &  6  augers,  i.  3 

i  pr.  old  cart  wheels,  i.  5 

i  portmantua, i.io. 

1  candle  stand,    .15. 

2  four  feet  walnut  tables,   4.16. 

i  Walnut  press,    6. 

I  Tea  bord,  3  waiters  &  i  bre.  basket,.  .  i.  5. 
i  Walnut  side  bord,   i.  4. 

i  ditto  knife  box,  .  4.6 

i  flax  hackell,    2. 

7  large  Maps,    14. 

1  Arm  &  12  plain  Walnut  chairs,  9.15. 

2  Walnut  desks,   12. 

5  Small  Walnut  Tables,  6.12.6 

i  Cheretree  chest  of  drawers, 6. 

i  Small  Cabinet,   3. 

1  Walnut  box  &  looking  glass,  .18. 

2  green  winsor  chairs,   .12. 

i  Walnut  chest  of  drawers,   6.  6. 

i  cheeck  real  &  looking  glass,  .14. 

i  parcel  of  chainey,  glass  &  earthen  ware,  12.16.6 

i  back  gamon  Table,    2.  8. 

i  Pine  Writing  Desk,   .6. 

i  cradle,  bed  &  furniture, .12. 

8  beds    and    furniture,    96. 

i  pr.  Damask  bed  Curtins, 9. 

I 1  rush  bottom  chairs,   i.  7.6 

i  Carpitt,     9. 

i  Silver  ladle,   12  Table  Spoons 

and  1 1  Tea  ditto, 15. 

i  Silver  rim  &  casters,  ..,,,,,  13. 

463 


APPENDIX 

I       Silver  rim,    8. 

i       ditto  tea  pott,   5- 

i       ditto   Salts,    i.  4- 

8      Table   cloths,    9-12. 

ii     knives  &  forks,   .18. 

i       large  Gun,  4-io- 

i       pr.    pistols,    3- 

i       pr.   potracks,   i   gridiron, 1.4. 

1  frying  pan  &  2  iron  tea  kitles, .17.6 

2  iron  spoons  &  flesh  forks,   .3. 

i       pr.  old  Steelyards  &  2  iron  Spits, .12. 

i       pr.  new         do.         i  bell  mettle  skillet,  2.  2. 

A  parcel  of  Tin  ware,   3. 

One  large  pine  press, i.  4- 

A  parcel  of  Tubs,  pails,  &c 3- 

1  Loom,  Warping  bars,  &c.  &c 3. 

4      flatt  irons  &  i  flax  wheel,  .16. 

2  pine  tables  &  6  pr.  cott.  cards, 1.6. 

i       fortepeano,    45- 

A  parcel  of  rum  hds.  casks,  &c •. .  3-6. 

4      jugs  &  i  Gallon  pott,  1.14- 

3  Spinning  wheels,  .14- 

Black  smiths  tools,    6. 

7      butter  pots,  6  pewter  basons, 

and  2  chamber  potts,  2.17. 

1  large  iron  kittle, 3. 

3  Stills  &  a  parcel  of  Still  tubs,  &c 76. 

4  pr.  andirons  &  i  iron  tribute,  3-12.6 

2  bottle  slides,  2  tea  canisters,    .13- 

4  trunks  &  5  iron  potts,  4.10. 

2  iron  skillets,  i  do.  kittle, i.  5- 

3  duch  ovens,    i. 

i       pr.  sheep  shairs,   .1.6 

7      candle  sticks,    i.  8. 

BOOKS : 

i       Vol.  Grotious  on  peace  &  War, 3- 

1  Peire    Williams'    rep'ts,     4.10. 

2  Strange's   reports,    3- 

1  "     Salkil's           do 2.  8. 

2  Vernon's               do 1.16. 

i       Vol.  Carthew's    do I.I. 

5  Modern          do 3- 

i         Equity   Ca.   in   Talbot's   time ,,  I.  4- 

464 


APPENDIX 

i  Virginia  Laws,    i. 

5  Bacon's  abridg'e  in  fol 9. 

3  Crock's   reports,    2.  8. 

i  Cumberback's  do i. 

i  Parkhurst's    Lexicon,    i.io. 

3  Cocke's  Institutes,    • 2. 

i  Hardwick's    reports,    2.  5. 

4  Blackston's  Comm'ty,    1.16. 

i  "     Equity  Ca.  in  Talbot's  time,   ....  1.4. 

i  Centris    reports,    i. 

1  Cocke's        do 1.16. 

2  "    Nelson's       do 2.  8. 

i          '     Hawkins's  Pleas  of  the  Cro 3. 

i  Swinborn  on   Wills,    .18. 

i  Rayman's  reports,  i. 

i  Orphan's  Legacy,   .10. 

1  Virginia   Laws,    .10. 

2  Chalmers'  Collect'n  of  Treats.  ...  1.4. 

2  Coleman's  Terance,   .12. 

i  Ward's  Es.  on  Gram •.  2. 

3  Modern  rep'ts,  a  brok'n  sett,  .18. 

i       Entick's    Dictionary,    .3. 

1  Vol.  Uses  &  trust,   .10. 

2  Spirit  of  Laws,   i. 

i          '     American    Negotiator,    .6. 

1  Vol.  Gibson's  Guide,  .  4.6 

7  Smallit's  Hist'y  of  England,    2.  2. 

2  Watson's    Horrace,    .10. 

1  Paraphrase     ...    on  the  Eps.  to 

the  Romans,   i.  4- 

3  Beeldfield's   Erudition,    2.  8. 

2  Robertson  Navega'n,   .12. 

i  Buchan's  Dom.  Medicine,   .15- 

3  '     Adams'  Defence  of  the  American 

Constitution,     .18. 

i  Impey's  practice,  .13- 

1  Bland  on  Decipl'n,  .6. 

2  Ramsey's  revolution  S.  Carol i. 

i         "     Milner's  Greek  Gram -  7-6 

i          '     Junious's    Letters,    -7-6 

i  Life  of  Dr.  Franklin,   .  4- 

1  Breviarin  Cronologe,  -7-6 

2  Newman's    Chimistry,     I- 

i         '    Juvenal,   .10. 

30  465 


APPENDIX 

I        "    Don  Quick  Zotte,    .6. 

1  "    Watts'  Hyms,    .3. 

2  Blair's  Sermons,  .10. 

i  Decalo  dis  Mortis,    .  2.6 

4  Proceed'g  &  debates  of  Parlem't,.  i.  4. 
i              Munford's    Poems,    .6. 

1  Cureosities  of  Spain, .7.6 

2  '    Homeri  Ilias,  i. 

i  D'Arsay,    .2.6 

i  Muir's  Introduction,   .3. 

i      Testament,    .1.3 

i      Vol.  Iradical  Vocabulary, .7.6 

i  History  of   Fra   Eugine,    .1.6 

i        "    Lord  Shefield's  Observa .6. 

i  Dismal    Fractions,    .12. 

1  Roman    Antiquities,     .12. 

2  '     Ovid's   Metamorphoses,    .12. 

i  Selctra  profanus,    .3. 

i  Compleat  Eng.  Farmer, .10. 

5  '    Monthly  review,   i.io. 

i  Conspiracy,   •  3- 

i  Spirit  of   Patriotism,    .  3- 

i          '     Juvenalis,     •  2- 

i  Selecta    Colequorum,    .1.6 

i  History   of    England,    .3. 

i  Clark  to  Dodwell,   .  3- 

i  Thompson's  Fables,  .2. 

i  Brooker's    Gazett'r,    .10. 

i  British   Youth's   Instructor,    .5- 

i  Robertson  Crueso,    .1.6 

i        "     Art's  Treas'r  of  Relig'n,  .1.3 

i  Gordin's   Gram -6. 

1  Vol.  Christian's  Consolation,   .2.6 

2  French  Prayer  Books,    •  3- 

i       Vol.  New  art  of  War, .1.6 

I  "     Abridgm't   of   the   celebrated   Mr. 

Pennett's  discrip'n  of  the  Brit. 

Capi'l,    •  3- 

i      Vol.  Elphenston  on  Education,  -2.6 

The  American  Constitu'n,  •  3- 

i       Vol.   Es.   on   Slavery,    •  2- 

i         "     Introduction  of  the  Gram .1.6 

i  All  for  the  best,    •  i-6 

i        "    Hyman  Reason, •  I-6 

466 


APPENDIX 

i        "    Debates  of  the  Convent'n,   .6. 

i          '    Munroe's  review,   .6. 

i  Bonepartte's  Camphain,    .6. 

i  The  Banished   Man,    .3. 

i       Spelling   Dictionary,    .3. 

i       Vol.    Pleasing  Instructor,    .3. 

i  Infant's    Lawyer,    .6. 

i          '    Antiquity  of  Greece,   .7.6 

i          '    Jacobinism,     .9. 

i  Euclid's   Elem'ts,    .7.6 

i  Guthrie's    Gram 1.4. 

1  Pronouncing  Spelling  Dictionary,    ...  .2. 

2  Vol.  Leland's  Demosthenes,   .12. 

i  Cocker's  Arethmatick, 1.9. 

i  Discorses  on  Religion,   .3. 

i  Pope's    Poems,    .2. 

i       large  old   Bible,    .7. 

i       Vol.    Page's   Travels,    .12. 

Creden's  Concordance,    .18. 

Glass's  Cookery,   .6. 

Dillon's  Travels  thro  Spain,    ....  .12. 

Modern  Conveyancer,   .  7.6 

Es.  on  Establishing  a  Standard,..  .  7.6 

Mottes's    Philosefical    Transact'gs,  .18. 

Danvers'    abridgment,     i.io. 

Ward's  4  Esays, .6. 

Dr.   Sydenham's   Works,    .3. 

Ward's   Mathematics,    .12. 

Parlem'y  register,  .12. 

N.   Test.    Grecum,   Hardy,    i. 

Preceptor,    .12. 

Barkley's  Greek  rudem'ts,  .6. 

Lex  Parliment .10. 

Tyrace's  directions,  .6. 

i  Wallace's  Gram .6. 

i  Vol.  Gibson's  Fair'rs  Guide, .6. 

i  Treatise  on  the  Mathematics,  ...  .6. 

1  Sacred  &  prof  am  history,   i.io. 

2  Johnson's    dictionary,    .12. 

i       Vol.  Sum'y  of  the  Crown  Law,   .6. 

i        "     Buller's  Nise  prius,   .10. 

i  Scott's   Lessons,    .4. 

1  Tisol  on  Phisick,   .6. 

2  "    Independant  Wigg,    .9. 

467 


APPENDIX 

i  Tillotson's    Sermons,    .3. 

i  Aneckdotes  on  Frederick,   .3. 

1  Education  compleat,    .3. 

2  Nature    displayed,    .6. 

i          '    Junious'  Letters, .6. 

i  Noxe's    Esays,     i          .6. 

4  Pope's  Odysey,   .12. 

3  Contea  Morax,    .9. 

i  Turkish  Spy,    .1.6 

I  Prophain   History,    .3. 

i  Fender's   works,    .1.6 

A  parcel  of  Greek  &  Lattin  books,  in  our 

estimation   worth    1.16. 

I       Vol.  Chimistry,   .7.6 

i  Modern  Farmer's  guide,    .3. 

i  Trials — Pads,     .3. 


5727.19.0 


D.  HENRY  -|  J.  SCOTT 

E.  WINSTON  j-exrs.  W.  COOPER 
GEO.  D.  WINSTON)                                                JOE  MARSHALL 

Memo. :  This  appraisement  and  Inventory  differs  in  as 
much  as  that  the  Inventory  given  by  Mrs.  Henry  was  agree 
able  to  the  number  of  cattle  turned  out  in  the  Spring  and  the 
appraisement  being  only  for  the  number  shown  at  the  time  of 
the  appraisement. 

J.    SCOTT 

JOE  MARSHALL 

W.  COOPER 

At  a  Court  held  for  Charlotte  County  the  6th  day  of  Sep 
tember,  1802,  this  Inventory  and  appraisement  of  the  estate 
of  Patrick  Henry,  dec'd.,  in  the  County  of  Charlotte,  was  this 
day  returned  by  Edmund  Winston,  one  of  the  executors,  and 
ordered  to  be  recorded. 

Teste,  THOMAS  READ,  Cl. 
A  Copy. 
THOMAS  READ,  Cler, 


APPENDIX 


INVENTORY  OF  THE  ESTATE  OF  PATRICK  HENRY, 
ESQ.,  DECEASED 

At  Red  Hill,   September  nth,   1802. 


NEGRO  MEN. 

Doctor,  Past  labor 

Peter,  decline  of  life 

Joe,  past  middle  age 

Bob,    : 

Daniel,  prime  of  life 

Scotchman,     do. 

Cato, 

NEGRO  BOYS  FROM  12  TO  16. 
Jack 
Daniel 
Ben 
Island  Ben 

NEGRO  WOMEN. 

Kate,  past  labor 

Betty, 

Dinah,  old  woman 

Beck,   decline   of   life 

Polly, 

Daphne, 

Mary,  prime  of  life 

Nell, 

NEGRO  GIRLS. 
Nancy 

NEGRO   CHILDREN. 
Pleasant 
Jesse 
Reuben 
Lettie 
Ned 

Jack  White 
Harrison 
Coleman 
Salley 
Robin 


Tom,  prime  of  life 

Isaac, 

Cajer, 

Jesse, 

John, 

Cesar, 

Fox, 


Shadrack 

Sam 

Solomon 


Anakey,  prime  of  life 

Cecily,         " 

Kate, 

Peg, 

Aylce, 

Anne, 

Critty,  very  infirm 


Salley 


Gib 

Squire 

Phil 

Violet 

Fanny 

Zebulon 

Louis 

Billy 

Patrick 

Betsey 


469 


APPENDIX 

NEGRO  CHILDREN  (Continued). 

Dinah  Simeon 

Abram  Molley 

Priscy  Hannah 

Polly  Jim 

Dicy  Peter 
Abby 

2  saddle  horses,   12  yrs.  likely 
i  saddle  horse,  5  yrs.  likely 

3  bay  horses,  12  yrs.  stout  &  strong 
i  sorrel,  12   yrs.   middle   size 

1  bay,  17  yrs.  middle  size 
gray,  4  yrs.  middle  size 
gray  mare,  4  yrs.  middle  size 
bay  mare,  7  yrs.  middle  size 
dark  bay  mare,  10  yrs.  Do. 
small  bay  mare,  18  yrs. 

gray  horse  colt,  3  yrs. 
gray  mare  colt,  3  yrs. 
black  mare  colt,  2  yrs. 

2  gray  colts,  i  yr. 
2  suckling  colts 

5  yoke  of   oxen 
128  head  of  cattle 
186  head  of  hogs 
38  head  of  sheep 

9  feather  beds  &  furniture 

8  table  cloths,  part  much  worn 

1  black  walnut  Press 

2  black  walnut  desks 

2  black  walnut  square  tables 
i  black  walnut  Side  board 

5  black  walnut  small  tables 
i  black  walnut  chest  of  drawers 
13  black  walnut  chairs 

3  Windsor  chairs 

i  Scotch  carpet  much  worn 

SILVER  PLATE. 
i  ladle 

i  doz.  table   spoons 
I  doz.  tea  spoons 

470 


APPENDIX 

SILVER  PLATE  (Continued). 
i  sett  of  castors 
i  Rim 

1  teapot 

2  salt  cellars 

KITCHEN  FURNITURE. 
l  small    iron    pot 
4  large  iron  pots  with  cracks  &  holes 

4  dutch  ovens  with  broken  lids 

I  iron  tea  kettle  hole   in  the  top 
i  iron  tea  kettle  without  top  or  handle 

1  large  iron  kettle 

3  pottle  pewter  basons 

2  pint  pewter  basons 

3  pottle    basons    &    i    old    dish    worth    no    more    than    old 
pewter 

2  pewter  chamber  pots 

7  large   earthen  dishes 

5  small  earthen  dishes 
I  turene 

1  large  china  bowl 

2  small  china  bowls 

10  china  tea  cups  &  saucers  of  broken  setts 

8  china  coffee  cups  &  saucers,  the  cups  cracked  &  without 
handles  chiefly 

Sundry  other  china  &  earthen  ware,  cracked  &  broke 

7  blue  edged  earthen  breakfast  plates 

8  white  large  earthen  plates 
16  blue  edged  earthen  plates 

2  iron   spits 

i  iron  skillet 

i  bell  metal  skillet 

4  glass  tumblers 

i  doz.  wine  glasses 

i  chariot  &  harness  for  4  horses 
i  single  chair  &  harness,   much  worn 
i  sett  of  B.  Smiths  tools,  indifferent 
i  smooth  boor  gun 

3  spinning  wheels 

i  loom  &  furniture 
i  glass  wheel  &  hatchel 

6  pr  of  cards 

i  back  gammon  table 

471 


APPENDIX 


4  pr  andirons,  much  injured 

2  pr  tongs  &  i  shovel 

3  mens  saddles  very  much  worn 


i  womans  saddle 
4  trunks 

1  pine  writing  desk 

2  "    tables 

i  large  pine  press 

6  butter  pots  &  4  jugs 

i  130  gallon  still  Virginia  made 
i  30  gallon  London  still 
I  large  iron  kettle 

1  gallon  measure 

7  large   maps 

2  ox  carts  &  2  chains 
i  waggon  &  geer 

i  tea  board  &  3  waiters 

i  bread  basket 

i  candle  stand  broke 

1  mahogany  knife  case   (struck  out  on  Mrs.  Winston  telling 

me  it  was  a  present  to  her  from  Capt.  Joseph  Scott.) 
pine  knife  box  &  8  old  knives  &  forks, 
pr  horsemans  pistols,  broken  locks 
check  reel 
large   decanter 
small 

2  tea  canisters 

2  bottle  sliders 

4  flat  irons,  very  indifferent 

4  screw  augers 

i  hand    saw 

i  pr  sheep  sheers 

3  nice  brass  candlesticks 

4  iron  candlesticks 
3  pr  snuffers 

crosscut  &  i   whip-saw 

brass   scale 

bar-sheer   plows 

fan  mill 

case  of  bottles 

sett  of  damask  bed  curtains,  very  much  worn 
plantation  utensils  for  22  hands 
3  looking   glasses,   2    somewhat    injured    and    small 
472 


APPENDIX 

The  stock  of  cattle  at  the  Seven  Islands  when  it  was  broke 
up  were  not  removed;  the  number  at  that  time  was  39,  one  of 
which  is  since  dead. 

Mrs.  Winston  before  her  marriage  gave  a  yoke  of  oxen 
&  4  cows  &  calves  to  Mrs.  Campbell  out  of  the  above  men 
tioned  number. 

I  have  not  seen  the  above  mentioned  stock  since  last  spring, 
but  if  no  accident  has  happened  to  them  there  are  about  28. 

WILLIAM  COOPER 


473 


Index 


ADAMS,  Charles  Francis,  on 
Henry's  oratory,  162-163. 

ADAMS,  Henry,  quoted,  331; 
424-425. 

ADAMS,  John,  on  the  assem 
bling  of  the  First  Continen 
tal  Congress,  151-153;  as  a 
diarist,  155-156;  his  de 
scriptions  of  delegates,  157; 
tells  of  Henry's  opening 
speech,  162;  of  the  business 
of  Congress,  168;  his  opin 
ion  of  Henry,  174;  describes 
the  Rutledges ,  174-175; 
spends  evening  with  Henry, 
175;  notes  the  social  side  of 
things,  175-176;  on  Henry's 
prescience ,  178-179;  251; 
Henry's  letter  to,  on  inde 
pendence,  253-254;  wit  of, 
254;  on  Thomas  Paine,  255; 
writes  "Thoughts  on  Gov 
ernment,"  262;  338,  409; 
names  Henry  Envoy  to 
France,  414. 

ADAMS,  John  Quincy,  ques 
tionable  story  in  "Diary" 
of,  308. 

ADAMS,  Samuel,  127;  com 
pared  with  Henry,  132-133; 
leadership  in  Massachusetts, 
143-144;  149;  sagacity  in 
Continental  Congress,  166, 
171-172;  251, 


ALEXANDER,  Rev.  Archibald, 
describes  Henry,  119;  352; 
on  Henry  in  court,  382-385; 
422. 

Alien  and  Sedition  laws,  407. 

Annapolis  Conference,  watched 
by  Henry,  333;  paves  the 
way  for  Constitutional  Con 
vention,  336. 

ATKINSON,  Roger,  describes 
Virginia  delegates  in  First 
Continental  Congress,  153- 

154- 

AYLETT,  Mrs.  Elizabeth,  Hen 
ry's  letters  to,  395-396;  an 
other  letter  to,  412-413. 

BACON,  Nathaniel,  resists  Ber 
keley,  77-78. 

BANCROFT,  George,  quoted, 
103,  132,  362. 

Baptists,  Henry's  relations 
with,  125-126. 

BARRE,  Isaac,  speech,   103. 

BERKELEY,  Norborne,  Baron 
de  Botetourt,  placatory 
character  of,  134. 

BERKELEY,  Sir  William,  hangs 
Drummond,  77-78. 

BERNARD,  Sir  Francis,  106. 

Bill  of  Rights,  framed  and 
adopted  in  the  May  Con 
vention  of  1776,  261  et 
seq. 

BLAIR,  Archibald,  415,  417, 


475 


INDEX 


BLAND,  Richard,  in  House  of     BRUCE,  Philip  A.,  studies  of, 


Burgesses,  76;  90,  97,  in, 
130,  143,  153,  184,  186,  219, 
256. 

BLAND,  Colonel  Theoderick, 
letter  from  St.  George  Tuc 
ker  to,  criticising  Henry, 
281. 

BOLLING,  Powhatan,  420. 

Boston,  in  1761,  89-90;  stir 
ring  times  in,  104-105;  133; 
Port  bill,  141,  1 80. 

BOUCHER,  Rev.  Jonathan, 
quoted,  245-246,  248. 

BOULDIN,  James  W.,  390 

BOULDIN,  Powhatan,  quoted, 
394(n). 

BRADLEY,    Arthur    Granville, 

27,  53.  8°- 

BRAXTON,  Carter,  offended  by 
Henry,  205-208;  219,  221- 
222;  his  plan  of  govern 
ment,  262;  283,  307. 

BRECKENRIDGE,  John,  311. 

British  Debt  Cause,  386,  etseq. 

BROCK,  Robert  A.,  on  John 
Henry's  descendants,  22(n), 
342  (n). 

BROOKS,  Nathan  C.,  his  Latin 
life  of  Henry,  33. 

BROUGHAM,  Lord,  the  Robert 
son  strain  in,  21;  on  the 
American  Revolution,  108; 
1 1 6,  270. 

BROWN,  Alexander,  historical 
views  stated,  11-12  (n). 

BROWN,  Henry  Armitt,  Henry 
in  the  First  Continental 
Congress,  163  (n). 


12  (n) ;  colonial  taverns, 
48. 

Burgesses,  House  of,  and  the 
King,  62-63;  in  Stamp  Act 
times,  81,  et  seq.;  Journals 
of,  112  (n),  128-129;  char 
acter  of,  128;  expiration  of, 
210. 

BURGOYNE,  General  John,  285, 
290,  301. 

BURK,  John  Daly,  historian, 
his  report  of  Henry's  Stamp 
Act  speech,  96  (n);  186. 

BURKE,  Edmund,  88;  his  plea 
for  America,  182,  330. 

BURNABY,   Rev.   Andrew,    54. 

BUTE,  Lord,  85,  et  seq. 

BUTLER,  Bishop  Joseph,  366. 

BYRD,  Colonel  William,  fit  for 
novel,  14;  visits  Mrs.  Sarah 
Syme,  15-16;  catches  tone 
of  his  time,  17. 

BYRON,  Lord,  on  Henry,  127. 

CABELL,  Dr.  George,  425,  et 
seq. 

CABELL,  William,  of  Union 
Hill,  in  House  of  Burgesses, 
81 ;  219, 

CABELL,  Judge  William  H., 
242  (n). 

CAMDEN,  Lord,  on  Congress, 
150,  174. 

CAMM,  Rev.  John,  anecdote 
of,  60-6 1 ;  Maury  to,  72. 

CAMPBELL,  Alexander,  in  Brit 
ish  Debt  Case,  387. 

CAMPBELL,  Colonel  Arthur, 
316. 


476 


INDEX 


CAMPBELL,  Charles,  historian, 
quoted,  62,  74,  277,  287. 

CAMPBELL,  Thomas,  the  poet, 
402. 

CAMPBELL,  General  William, 
marries  Henry's  sister  Eliz 
abeth,  236;  stories  of,  236- 

237;  395- 
Carpenters'     Hall,     described, 

I57-I59- 

CARRINGTON,  Colonel  Clement, 
420. 

CARRINGTON,  General  Ed 
ward,  at  St.  John's  Church, 
198. 

CARRINGTON,  Judge  Paul,  in 
House  of  Burgesses,  81,  97, 
99,  219-220. 

CARTER,  Landon,  his  queru 
lous  letter  to  Washington 
about  Henry,  280,  282;  299. 

CARTER,  Robert,  client  of 
Henry,  369. 

GARY,  Archibald,  described, 
81;  256;  alleged  threat 
against  Henry,  276-277; 
278;  279. 

Cavalier  element  in  Virginia, 
dispute  thereon,  10-11. 

Charlotte  County,  calls  for  In 
dependence,  251;  great  po 
litical  meeting  at  Court 
house  in,  419,  et  seq. 

CHASE,  Samuel,  in  Continental 
Congress,  171,  172. 

CHASTELLUX,     Chevalier     de, 

249.   3IQ.   375- 

CHATHAM,  Lord,  greatness  of, 
86;  87,  127;  Henry  com 


pared  with,  130-132;  147; 
148;  tribute  to  the  First 
Continental  Congress,  151; 
174,  181. 

Cherokees,  stirred  to  war,  294. 

CHRISTIAN,  Colonel  William, 
as  law  student  with  Henry, 
114;  as  Henry's  brother- 
in-law,  234,  235,  236,  294, 
305;  is  killed  by  Indians, 
334-335  (n). 

CLAY,  Henry,  a  Hanover  boy, 
40;  story  by,  288. 

CLARK,  General  George  Rog 
ers,  is  aided  by  Henry  in  the 
conquest  of  the  Northwest 
Territory,  293,  et  seq.;  297. 

CLINTON,  George,  plan  for  a 
convention  to  amend  Con 
stitution,  358. 

Committees  of  Correspond 
ence,  origin  of,  139,  143- 
144. 

Committee  of  Safety,  219,  et 
seq.;  234,  257. 

Congress,  Continental,  origin 
ates  in  Committees  of  Cor 
respondence,  139",  Massa 
chusetts  delegates  en  route 
to,  144,  151-153;  Virginia 
delegates  described,  1 53- 
154;  and  on  the  way  to  Phil 
adelphia,  155-156;  members 
of,  157,  et  seq.;  organizes, 
162;  Henry's  first  speech  in, 
162-165;  and  second  speech, 
165-166;  gives  each  colony 
equal  voice,  167;  stands  by 
Massachusetts,  168;  consid- 


477 


INDEX 


ers  the  Galloway  plan,  169- 
170;  its  work,  169,  et  seq.; 
wisdom  of,  173-174;  Second 
Congress,  213,  et  seq.;  Hen 
ry's  attempts  to  help,  332. 

CONNOLLY,  John,  as  Henry's 
antithesis,  200. 

Constitution  of  the  United 
States,  327-330;  conven 
tion  to  frame  proposed,  336; 
adopted,  339;  debates  on  in 
Virginia,  327,  et  seq. 

Constitution  of  Virginia, 
framed  in  the  May  Conven 
tion  of  1776,  261-269. 

CON  WAY,  Moncure  D.,  331, 
333;  on  E.  Randolph's  inno 
cence,  336. 

CONWAY,  General  Thomas,  or 
ganizes  a  cabal  against 
Washington,  288,  et  seq. 

COOKE,  John  Esten,  on  "Old 
Capitol,"  92  (n);  210;  on 
Henry's  power  as  an  orator, 

259- 

COOTES  (or  Coutts),  Mr.  Hen 
ry's  first  client,  compares 
young  Patrick  to  Lord  Lov- 
at,  73. 

CORBIN,  Francis,  118,  344; 
ridicules  Henry  and  is  over 
whelmed,  360-362;  436. 

CORBIN,  Richard,  204,  208. 

CORNBURY,  Lord,  scene  in  his 
Council  Chamber,  New  York, 

52-53- 

CORNWALLIS,    Lord,    301-310. 

CRAWFORD,  Thomas,  his  Hen 
ry  statue,  1 1 8,  119. 


CUMMINS,  E.  H.,  quoted,  328. 

DABNEY,  Charles,  180,  205, 
429. 

DABNEY,  George,  quoted  about 
Henry,  38,  116,  124,  202, 
204-205,  429. 

DANDRIDGE,  Bartholomew, 
Henry's  letter  to,  238;  257. 

DANDRIDGE,  Dorothea  Spots- 
wood,  mother-in-law  of  Pat 
rick  Henry,  318-319. 

DANDRIDGE,  Colonel  Nathan 
iel  W.,  Henry  at  house  of, 
43-44;  employs  Henry  as 
counsel,  75;  becomes  Hen 
ry's  father-in-law,  318. 

DAVIES,  Rev.  Samuel,  Henry's 
model  in  oratory,  56-58. 

DAWSON,  John,  344,  352. 

DEANE,  Silas,  on  Virginia  del 
egates,  156-157;  on  Henry 
as  a  speaker,  167-168. 

"Decius,"  attacks  Henry,  363, 

437- 

DICKINSON,  John,  in  Stamp 
Act  Congress,  106;  134;  his 
character  and  political  posi 
tion,  159-160;  draws  ad 
dress  to  King  George,  170- 
171;  213;  his  attitude  on 
Independence,  252. 

Dictator  of  Virginia,  alleged 
scheme  for  in  December, 

J776»  275'  et  se(J->  in  the 
Tarleton  Crisis,  308-309. 

DIGGES,  Dudley,  on  Commit 
tee  of  Safety,  219,  220. 

DRESSER,  Rev.  Charles, 
366  (n). 


478 


INDEX 


DUANE,  James,  in  Continen 
tal  Congress,  157,  336. 

DUNMORE,  Lord,  135;  charac 
ter  of,  138;  140,  179;  seizes 
gunpowder,  199,  et  seq.; 
beaten  at  Great  Bridge, 
221-222;  232; 272-273; 294. 

FAUQUIER,  Gov.  Francis,  and 
the  Twopenny  Act,  62; 
gives  musical  parties,  79; 
93,  99,  101,  104. 

Fee  Books,  49,   115. 

FLEMING,  John,  95. 

FONTAINE,  Edward,  187, 
366  (n),  386,  436  (n). 

FONTAINE,  Mrs.  Martha,  Hen 
ry's  daughter,  238,  425. 

FONTAINE,  Colonel  Patrick 
Henry,  293,  366  (n),  386;  on 
Henry's  habits,  404-405; 
describes  Henry's  death 
scene,  426-428. 

FISKE,  John,   12  (n),  63,  330. 

FOOTE,  Rev.  William,  quoted, 
52,  125  (n). 

FORCE,  Peter,  cited,  181. 

FRANCISCO,  Peter,  302. 

FRANKLIN,  Benjamin,  pro 
poses  Colonial  Congress, 
105;  149;  in  Second  Con 
gress,  213;  233;  on  the  Fed 
eral  Constitution,  339-340. 

France,  aid  expected  from, 
177-178;  deference  to  in 
the  matterof  Independence, 
252-253,  259;  effect  of  alli 
ance  with,  299-300. 

FRIEDENWALD,  Herbert, 
quoted,  251. 


French  Revolution,  367,  411- 
412. 

FROTHINGHAM,  Richard,  quo 
ted,  101,  103. 

G  A  D  s  D  E  N  ,  Christopher,  at 
Stamp  Act  Congress,  106- 
107. 

GAGE,  General  Thomas,  in 
New  York,  106;  in  Boston, 
124;  199. 

GALLATIN,  Albert,  is  advised 
by  Henry,  293. 

GALLOWAY,  Joseph,  character 
of,  159 ;  plan  of  government 
in  America,  169-170. 

GARLAND, Hugh, A. quoted, 424. 

GATES,  General  Horatio,  290, 
292. 

GEORGE  III,  84  et  seq.\  93,  108, 
132,  181. 

GERRY,  Elbridge,  339;  "ger 
rymandering,"  359. 

GIRARDIN,  Louis  Hue,  his 
torian,  quoted,  209;  on  Dic 
tatorship,  276,  308. 

GORDON,  Rev.  William,  quo 
ted,  101-102. 

GRAYSON,  Senator  William, 
311,  339;  in  Virginia  Fed 
eral  Convention,  344;  is 
elected  United  States  Sena 
tor,  359;  dies,  363. 

GREENE,  General  Nathanael, 
his  military  studies,  230; 
for  independence  after  Bun 
ker  Hill,  254;  301-303. 

GRENVILLE,  George,  80;  elab 
orates  the  Stamp  Act,  88 
et  seq. 


479 


INDEX 


GRIGSBY,  Hugh  Blair,  on  cav 
aliers,  10 ;  on  Virginia  celeb 
rities,  80;  99,  108,  135, 
187;  on  Henry's  committee 
work,  261;  on  Mason,  268- 
269;  on  Jefferson,  274;  277; 
on  Henry  and  Cornwallis, 
302;  318  (n);  341  (n);  his 
history  of  the  Virginia  Fed 
eral  Convention,  342  (n). 

GUARDOQUI,  Don  Diego,  his 
project  to  acquire  the  Miss 
issippi  Valley  for  Spain,  334; 

337.  338- 

HAMILTON, Alexander,  33  2, 33  6, 
338;  his  Assumption  Act, 
363;  401-402  (n),  407-408. 

HAMILTON,  Colonel  Henry,  is 
captured  by  Clark,  296. 

Hampden-Sidney  College, 
Henry's  interest  in,  312; 
incident  at,  341;  421. 

HANCOCK,  John,  124,  149,  213; 
chagrin  of  when  Washing 
ton  was  made  Commander- 
in-chief,  216;  370. 

Hanover  County,  colonial 
merry-making  in,  13 ;  Court 
house,  66;  holds  represent 
atives  responsible,  129-130; 
left  by  Henry,  250;  Han 
over  Town,  281. 

HARRISON,  Benjamin,  in 
House  of  Burgesses,  81 ;  143, 
154,  216;  as  Speaker  of  the 
Assembly,  305;  is  succeeded 
by  Henry  as  Governor,  316; 
in  Virginia  Federal  Con 
vention,  344,  et  seq. 


HARRISON,    Mrs.    Matthew 

Bland,    246,   399  (n). 
HAZLETON,  John  H.,  quoted, 

255- 

HUNT,  Gaillard,  quoted,  261. 

HENDERSON,  Richard,  claims 
Kentucky,  295. 

HENRY,  David,  of  the  Gentle 
man's  Magazine,  33. 

HENRY,  Dorothea  Dandridge, 
second  wife  of  Patrick,  mar 
riage  of,  318-320;  324-325, 
380,  428;  her  marriage  to 
Judge  Winston,  457. 

HENRY,  Elizabeth,  sister  of 
Patrick,  235-237. 

HENRY,  John,  the  immigrant, 
father  of  Patrick,  marries, 
21 ;  character  of,  22;  de 
scendants,  22;  starts  sons 
in  business,  36;  presiding 
magistrate,  trial  of  "Par 
sons'  Cause,"  67-74;  map  of 
Virginia  by,  112-113  (n)l 
dies,  113. 

HENRY,  Colonel  John,  son  of 
Patrick,  opinion  of  Wirt's 
"Sketches,"  29  (n);  390, 
399;  457  (n). 

HENRY,  Rev.  Patrick,  settles 
in  Hanover,  23;  "Uncle 
Patrick,"  32,  at  Hanover 
Court-house,  66-67 "»  death 
of,  238. 

HENRY,  Patrick,  lineage,  16- 
23;  birth,  24;  schooling,  24- 
25;  boyhood  traits,  25-35; 
reading,  32-34;  storekeeper, 
36;  store-book  of,  38-39; 


480 


INDEX 


marries  Sarah  Shelton,  40; 
as  farmer,  41-42;  second 
mercantile  venture,  42-43; 
studies  law,  45;  is  licensed 
to  practice,  45-47;  bar- 
keeping,  story  about,  48; 
•  fee-books,  49 ;  in ^Eaiwons' 
Qause^'  65^24;  at  Williams- 
burg  in  the  case  of  Dan- 
dridge  vs.  Littlepage,  75-76; 
enters  House  of  Burgesses 
as  a  member  from  Louisa, 
77-78;  opposes  public-loan 
scheme,  82-84;  advocates 
resistance  against  the  en 
forcement  of  the  Stamp 
Act^-lpi,  ei  seqr.;  his  resolu 
tions  against  Stamp  Act, 
94-95;  in  "bloody  debate" 
against,  95-98;  memoran 
dum  on  back  of  Resolutions, 
100;  effect  of  his  resistance 
speech,  105,  et  seq.;  com 
pared  with  Otis,  109-110; 
his  celebrity,  112;  his  life 
in  Louisa  County,  113-115; 
his  practice,  115-116;  por 
traits  of  him,  117-119;  per 
sonal  appearance,  120-122; 
voice,  123;  dress,  124;  habits 
124;  relations  with  Quakers 
and  Baptists,  125-126;  his 
oratory  likened  to  that  of 
Demosthenes,  127;  his  early 
leadership,  128-130;  sent 
to  the  Convention  of  1774, 
143;  to  Congress,  143;  rides 
north  with  Washington, 
154-156;  his  eloquence  in 

481 


Carpenters'  Hall,  162-166;  ! 
Silas  Deane  on,  167-168; 
opposes  Galloway  plan,  169; 
on  Committee  to  prepare 
the  address  to  the  King, 
170-171;  his  committee 
work,  173;  on  the  greatest 
man  in  the  First  Congress, 
174;  talks  with  John  Adams, 
175;  foresees  Independence, 
177-178;  foresees  war,  178- 
179;  organizes  Hanover  mi 
litia,  1 80;  attends  Second 
Virginia  Convention,  182; 
introduces  resolutions  to 
arm  the  colony,  183-184; 
delivers  his  greatest  oration, 
189-191 ;  effect  of  his  speech 
191-193;  his  manner  de 
scribed,  193-196;  speech  to 
Hanover  militia,  203;  his 
Gunpowder  Expedition, 
203,  et  seq.',  in  Second  Con 
gress,  212-216;  in  Third 
Virginia  Convention,  217; 
made  Colonel  of  the  First 
Regiment  and  Virginia 
Commander-in-Chief ,  218; 
friction  with  Pendleton, 
221,  et  seq.;  resigns,  224- 
225;  addressed  by  officers, 
225-226;  his  military  ca 
pacity  considered,  230-231; 
at  the  turning  point  of  his 
career,  233;  loses  his  wife, 
238;  at  "Scotchtown,"  238, 
et  seq.;  gives  advice  to  his 
daughter  on  her  marriage, 
243-244;  his  treatment  of 


INDEX 


his  slaves,  245;  his  letter  to 
R.  Pleasants  on  slavery, 
246-247;  is  sick,  249-250; 
sells  "Scotchtown,"  250;  is 
elected  to  the  Fifth  Conven 
tion,  251;  his  cautious  atti 
tude  on  Independence,  252; 
et  seq. ;  leads  popular  party, 
257;  speech  for  Independ 
ence,  259-260;  letters  to  R. 
H.  Lee  and  John  Adams, 
262-263;  cooperates  with 
Mason,  265,  et  seq.;  author 
of  the  1 5th  and  i6th  sec 
tions  of  the  Bill  of  Rights, 
266-267;  favors  veto  power, 
268;  is  elected  first  Com 
monwealth  Governor,  270; 
installed  in  the  "Palace"  at 
Williamsburg,  272;  his  hard 
work  as  Governor,  273;  his 
illness,  274;  strange  story  as 
— ^  *"'  to  giving  him  dictatorial 
\  powers,  275,  et  seq.;  is  criti 
cised  by  Landon  Carter, 
280;  by  St.  George  Tucker, 
281-284;  his  measures  for 
the  defense  of  Virginia,  284; 
his  letters  to  and  from 
Richard  Henry  Lee  and 
Washington,  286;  efforts  to 
draw  him  into  the  Conway 
Cabal,  290-291;  and  his  let 
ters  to  Washington  on  the 
subject,  291-292;  encour 
ages  George  Rogers  Clark 
to  undertake  the  conquest 
of  the  Northwest,  293,  et 
seq.;  retires  from  the  gov- 

482 


ernorship,  298;  his  letter  to 
Mason,  300;  to  Jefferson, 
300;  in  Henry  County,  302; 
at  Charlottesville  with  the 
Legislature,  303;  flight  of 
305-306;  offends  Jefferson, 
307-309;  his  work  in  the 
Assembly  after  the  Revo 
lutionary  war,  310,  et  seq.; 
advocates  the  return  of  the 
Tories,  3 1 2-3 1 4 ;  against  too 
much  taxation,  315;  suc 
ceeds  Harrison  as  Governor, 
316;  his  marriage  to  Doro 
thea  Dandridge,  318;  at 
Leather-wood,  320,  et  seq.; 
and  the  Federal  Constitu 
tion,  327,  et  seq.;  his  atti-  r 
tude  up  to  1786  and  why  heA 
changed  it,  33°-335;  ef-  j 
forts  to  induce  him  to  go  to^ 
the  Philadelphia  Conven 
tion,  336-337;  Washing 
ton's  attempt  to  placate 
him,  340;  his  powerful 
speeches  in  the  Virginia 
Federal  Convention,  344, 
et  seq.;  attacks  upon  him, 
350-351;  his  thunder-storm 
speech,  354;  his  acquies 
cence  in  the  result,  357;  is 
feared  by  the  Federalist 
leaders,  358;  and  "gerry 
mandering,"  359;  as  a  law 
yer,  365,  et  seq.;  his  books, 
365-367  (and  Appendix  D); 
his  large  fees,  370;  his  love 
of  money,  371;  anecdotes 
about,  372,  et  seq.;  his  ridi- 


INDEX 


cule  of  "Johnny"  Hook, 
375-377;  his  power  in  crim 
inal  cases,  378-379;  in  the 
Richard  Randolph  case, 
380-382;  in  the  British 
Debt  case,  386-392;  retires 
to  Red  Hill,  393,  et  seq.;  his 
land  investments,  400-402; 
his  habits  in  old  age,  403, 
et  seq.;  his  favorite  servants, 
405-406;  his  political  views 
at  this  time,  406;  and  Jeffer 
son  408-412;  his  letter  to 
Mrs.  Aylett,  412-413;  many 

^•honors  offered  him,  414; 
helps  Marshall,  415-416; 
and  Washington,  416-419; 
offers  for  the  Assembly,  419, 

^  et  seq.;  his  last  public  ap 
pearance,  4 1 9-42  5 ;  his 
death,  426-428;  his  charac 
ter  sketched  by  Judge 
Spencer  Roane,  435,  et  seq.; 
his  will,  455-459. 

HENRY,  Mrs.  Sarah  Shelton, 
first  wife  of  Patrick,  mar 
ried,  40 ;  family,  40  (n) ; 
dies,  238. 

HENRY,  Mrs.  Sarah  Winston, 
mother  of  Patrick,  de 
scribed,  15-19;  descendants, 
22  (n) ;  children,  24;  only 
letter  by,  237-238;  death 
of,  238. 

HENRY,  William  Wirt,  his 
searching  study  of  his 
grandfather's  life,  29-30; 
on  barkeeping  story,  48; 
109,  117-118,  120;  on  the 


peril  of  the  Galloway  plan, 
169;  202;  on  Mason,  Henry 
and  the  Bill  of  Rights,  265, 
et  seq.;  on  the  Dictatorship, 
278;  335,  352;  on  the  de 
bates  in  the  Virginia  Fed 
eral  Convention,  363-364; 
380,  385;  on  the  British 
Debt  case,  391;  426  (n). 
Henry  County,  302;  Patrick 
Henry's  residence  in,  320- 

323- 

HOLCOMBE,  Colonel  John,  ad 
vises  Henry  to  return  to  the 
bar,  324. 

HOOK,  John,  his  amusing 
case,  375-377- 

HOSMER,  James  K.,  quoted, 
144. 

HOWE,  Henry,  historian,  375, 

392»  399- 

HOWISON,  Robert,  historian, 
quoted,  73  (n);  79,  96. 

Independence,  Henry  as  the 
prophet  of,  177-178;  his 
peculiar  position  on,  251, 
et  seq.;  Virginia  delegates  in 
Congress  directed  to  "pro 
cure"  a  declaration  of,  258; 
moved  by  R.  H.  Lee,  260. 

INNES,  James,  in  the  Vir 
ginia  Federal  Convention 
344,  441;  in  the  British 
Debt  Case,  387. 

IREDELL,  Judge  James,  his 
letter  from  Pierce  Butler 
on  the  beginning  of  section 
alism,  333;  in  the  British 
Debt  case,  390-392;  417. 


483 


INDEX 


JACKSON,     General     Andrew, 

sees  Henry,  368. 
JAMES,    Edward   W.,    quoted, 

92  (n). 
JARRATT,      Rev.      Devereux, 

colonial  teacher  in  Hanover, 

24-25. 
JAY,  John,  in  the  Continental 

Congress,  169,  173;  213;  his 

treaty  with  Guardoqui,  334; 

335;    when    Chief    Justice, 

390-39 1- 

JEFFERSON,  Thomas.  first 
meets  Henry,  42-43;  tells 
of  Henry's  examination  for 
the  law,  45 ;  bartender  story, 
48;  and  Wirt,  49;  fees,  50; 
and  Fauquier,  79;  on  Pen- 
dleton,  82;  on  Henry's  im- 
pressiveness  in  combating 
the  Robinson  loan-office 
scheme,  82-84;  describes 
Stamp  Act  scenes,  96,  99; 
1 08;  on  Henry's  leadership, 
in,  1 3  6 ;  on  patriot  proce 
dure  in  Dunmore's  time, 
137;  his  "Summary  View," 
138;  on  origin  of  Commit 
tees  of  Correspondence,  139- 
142;  on  Henry  in  the  First 
Congress,  171-172,  180,  199; 
belittles  Henry's  work  in 
the  Second  Congress,  214- 
215;  216,  217,  233,  248; 
writes  Declaration  of  Inde 
pendence,  260;  his  plan  of 
government  for  Virginia, 
262;  attacks  the  laws  of 
primogeniture  and  entail, 


274-275;  his  story  as  to 
Dictatorship,  275,  et  seq.; 
281,  296;  succeeds  Henry  as 
Governor  of  Virginia,  298; 
is  powerless  to  check  Brit 
ish  depredations,  303;  hu 
miliation  of,  304,  et  seq.; 
blames  Henry  for  an  inves 
tigation  resolution,  307- 
308;  331,  332;  in  France, 
337;  his  Poplar  Forest  place 
368;  400-401  (n) ;  and  Hen 
ry,  407-411. 

JENYNS,  Soame,  365. 

JOHNSON,  Thomas,  champions 
Henry  in  the  May  Conven 
tion  of  1776,  257. 

JOHNSON,  William,  burgess 
succeeded  by  Henry  in  1765, 

79- 

JOHNSTON,  George,  supports 
Henry  in  Stamp  Act  fight, 

93.  95- 

JONES,  Joseph,  332. 
JOUETTE,        Captain        John, 

warns     Jefferson    and    the 

Assembly,  303;  305. 
KENTUCKY    resolutions,     407. 
LAFAYETTE,    General,    makes 

friends    with    Henry,    293 ; 

campaigns  in  Virginia,  301. 
LAMB,  General  John,  344. 
LATROBE,    B.    H.,    his    Henry 

sketches,  118,  120. 
LAURENS,  Henry,  President  of 

Congress,  anecdote  of,  288. 
LEAR,  Tobias,  362. 
"  Leatherwood,"     Henry's 

home  at,  320-323. 


484 


INDEX 


LECKY,  William  E.  H.,  quoted, 
130. 

LEE,  General  Charles,  on  In 
dependence,  252-253;  his 
machinations  against  Wash 
ington,  289,  et  seq. 

LEE,  Francis  Lightfoot,  141; 
Henry's  letter  to  on  gun 
powder  expedition,  209. 

LEE,  General  Henry,  from 
college  to  army,  231;  245, 
326;  in  the  Virginia  Federal 
Convention,  344;  brings 
Washington  and  Henry  to 
gether,  418;  452. 

LEE,  Richard  Henry,  in  the 
House  of  Burgesses,  82;  90- 
91;  127,  134,  141,  143,  153; 
his  labors  in  Continental 
Congress,  170,  173;  179,  183, 
1 88,  252-253;  moves  the 
Independence  of  the  United 
States,  260;  262,  265;  corre 
sponds  with  Patrick  Henry, 
286;  his  great  services  in  the 
Revolution,  287;  friendship 
with  Henry,  287;  the  "Lee 
scandal,"  so-called,  287- 
288,  310;  as  Henry's  friend 
ly  antagonist,  310,  et  seq.; 
anecdote  of,  316;  331,  be 
comes  United  States  Sena 
tor,  359;  371,  407,  442-444, 

45o- 

LEE,  General  Robert  E.,  his 
maternal  grandfather,  1 6 ; 

23°".  3!9- 

LEE,  Thomas  Ludwell,  219, 
257;  wants  all  State  Con 


stitutions  on  uniform  model, 

261 ;  265,  275,  287. 
LEONARD,  Daniel,  132. 
LEWIS,     Andrew,     described, 

218;  260;  crushes  Dunmore, 

273- 

LEWIS,   Charles,    218. 

LEWIS,  John,  encourages  Hen 
ry  to  study  law,  45;  counsel 
in  "Parsons'  Cause,"  65. 

LEWIS,  Thomas,  99. 

LEWIS,  William,  and  Henry, 
306. 

LITTLEPAGE,  James,  his  seat 
contested,  75. 

LIVINGSTON,  Philip,  in  Con 
tinental  Congress,  157. 

LIVINGSTON,  William,  in  Con 
tinental  Congress,  157. 

Long  Island,  one  of  Henry's 
homes,  394,  et  seq. 

Louisa  County,  Henry's  resi 
dence  in,  112,  et  seq. 

LOWNDES,   Rawlins,   355. 

LYNCH,  Thomas,  in  Stamp 
Act  Congress,  106;  in  Conti 
nental  Congress,  157. 

LYONS,  Mrs.  Elizabeth  Henry, 
399  (n);  her  Red  Hill  pen 
pictures,  405. 

LYONS,  Judge  Peter,  King's 
counsel  in  the  "Parsons' 
Cause,"  65,  68,  71,  72,  74; 
amusing  adventure  of,  303- 
304;  400. 

MADISON,  Dolly,  Isaac  Wins 
ton's  great-granddaughter, 
20;  spent  childhood  at 
"Scotchtown,"  240-241. 


485 


INDEX 


MADISON,  James,  in  the  May 
Convention  of  1776,  256; 
311;  and  the  Federal  Con 
vention,  329-330;  332,  336, 
337;  in  the  Virginia  Federal 
Convention,  343,  et  seq.; 
elected  to  Congress,  363; 
407,  45Q-451- 

MAKEMIE,  Rev.  Francis, 
founder  of  Presbyterian- 
ism  in  America,  52. 

MARSHALL,  John,  on  biogra 
phers,  30;  1 01,  1 1 8,  1 88; 
lieutenant  under  Henry, 
220;  311,  335,  339;  in  the 
Virginia  Federal  Conven 
tion,  344,  et  seq.;  in  the 
British  Debt  case,  387; 
aided  by  Henry  in  his  Con 
gressional  campaign,  415- 
416. 

MARTIN,  Luther,  356. 

MASON,  George,  134;  on  Hen 
ry,  140-141;  in  the  Third 
Virginia  Convention,  217; 
on  Committee  of  Safety, 
219;  described,  264;  appears 
in  the  May  Convention  of 
1776  and  becomes  the  gen 
ius  of  the  hour,  264,  et  seq.; 
chief  author  of  the  Bill  of 
Rights,  265-266;  tributes 
to,  268-269;  275>  296,  311. 
317  (n),  328,  329,  330,  338; 
in  Virginia  Federal  Conven 
tion,  344  et  seq.;  367,  372, 
407. 

Massachusetts,  102;  Revolu 
tionary  spirit  in,  104-105; 


at  school  to  S.  Adams,  133; 
applauded,  134;  exit  of 
Loyalists  from,  210. 

MATTHEWS,  General  Edward, 
his  invasion  of  Virginia,  284. 

MAURY,  Rev.  James,  plaintiff 
in  the  "Parsons'  Cause," 
59-60;  61;  his  school,  64; 
in  Court,  65-72;  104. 

MAZZEI,   Philip,   410. 

McCLURG,  Dr.  James,  339,  448. 

McDowALL,  Arthur  S.,  quo 
ted.  131. 

McREE,  G.  J.,  quoted,  390. 

MEADE,  Bishop  William,  quo 
ted,  54;  62,  366  (n). 

MEADE,  Captain  W.  T.,  tells  of 
Henry  in  Louisa  County, 
113-114. 

MERCER,  General  Hugh,   218. 

MEREDITH,  Colonel  Samuel, 
on  Henry's  boyhood,  25 
and  Appendix  A;  with  Hen 
ry  at  Hanover  Court-house, 
66;  113;  on  Gunpowder  Ex 
pedition,  204,  et  seq.;  235, 
242,  319;  statement  of,  431, 
et  seq. 

MILLER,  John,  421. 

Mississippi,  proposed  occlu 
sion  of,  333,  et  seq.;  referred 
to  by  Henry  in  the  constitu 
tional  debates,  348;  410. 

MONROE,  James,  letter  from 
that  powerfully  influenced 
Henry,  333~334;  339'.  in 
Virginia  Federal  Conven 
tion,  344,  et  seq.;  Jefferson 
to,  409, 


486 


INDEX 


MONTGOMERY,  James,  his  al 
leged  authorship  of  the 
"Decius"  letters,  363. 

MORDECAI,  Samuel,  quoted, 
342- 

MORRIS,  Samuel,  built  first 
dissenters'  ' '  reading  house , ' ' 
Hanover,  56;  juror  in  "Par 
sons'  Cause,"  68. 

"Mount  Brilliant,"  Henry's 
boyhood  home,  23,  24,  36, 
112,  239. 

MUHLENBERG,  Peter  Gabriel, 
hears  Henry's  resistance 
speech,  188. 

Navy,  Virginia's  Revolution 
ary,  284. 

NELSON,  General  Thomas,  in 
St.  John's  Church,  197- 
198;  moves  Independence  in 
the  May  Convention  of 
1776,  258-259;  270,  is  made 
Governor,  307;  323. 

NELSON,  Judge  Hugh,  33. 

New  London  Court-house,  fa 
mous  trials  there,  375. 

New  York,  9;  Stamp  Act  agi 
tation  in,  104;  meeting 
there  of  the  Stamp  Act  Con 
gress,  106-107;  visited  by 
Henry,  130;  Federal  Con 
vention  of,  343. 

NICHOLAS,  George,  307,  309, 
332,  344,  et  seq. 

NICHOLAS,  John,  said  to  have 
written  the  "Decius"  pa 
pers,  363,  437. 

NICHOLAS,  Robert  Carter,  45- 
47;  81,  in;  turns  over  law 


practice  to  Henry,  116;  184, 
1 86;  as  peacemaker,  200, 
204. 

NICHOLAS,  Wilson,  344,  et  seq. 

NORTH,  Lord,  133;  concilia 
tory  proposals,  210. 

OTIS,  James,  speech  against 
search  warrants,  63 ;  fiery 
eloquence  of,  89-90;  102, 
105,  1 06;  and  Henry,  109- 
no,  132. 

OLIVER,  Frederick  Scott,  quo 
ted,  192. 

PAGE,  John,  16;  and  Dun- 
more,  200;  219;  273. 

PAINE,  Thomas,  as  exciseman, 
89;  his  "Crisis,"  161;  his 
"Common  Sense,"  255;  279; 
his  "Age  of  Reason,"  366 
(n). 

"Parsons'  Cause,"  58-74. 
Patrick  County,  set  off  from 
Henry,  321. 

PENDLETON,  Edmund,  33,  35; 
Jefferson  on,  82;  90,  109, 
in,  127,  143,  154,  155,  184, 
186,  216-217,  219;  influ 
ences  Henry's  career,  221, 
et  seq.;  defended  by  Grigs- 
by,  227-228;  233,  234;  in 
the  May  Convention  of 
1776,  256,  et  seq.;  270,  275; 
at  the  Virginia  Federal 
Convention,  342,  et  seq.; 
439-440,  450. 

Philadelphia,  at  the  time  of 
the  First  Continental  Con 
gress,  1 58-1 59 ;  its  entertain 
ments  to  the  delegates,  168, 


487 


INDEX 


175-176;  soldiers  in,  213; 
military  fervor  in,  216. 

PHILIPS,  Josiah,  attainted 
Tory,  case  of,  350. 

PHILLIPS,  General  William, 
invades  Virginia,  301. 

"Pine  Slash,"  Henry's  first 
farm,  40-42. 

PLEASANTS,  Robert,  Henry's 
letter  to  on  slavery,  246- 
247. 

POPE,  Nathaniel,  quoted 
about  W.  Winston,  20; 
about  Henry,  30,  31;  about 
Henry  on  Independence, 
177-178;  187,  204;  on  Hen 
ry's  humor,  235,  429. 

POSEY,  General  Thomas,  Hen 
ry's  influence  on,  352. 

PRESTON,  Thomas  L.,  quoted, 
236-237  (n). 

Prince  Edward  County,  Henry 
moves  to,  323;  represents 
in  Legislature,  340;  famous 
trial  in,  380-382. 

QUESNAY,  Chevalier,  342. 

RANDALL,  Henry  Stephens, 
299. 

RANDOLPH,  David  Meade,  358, 
417. 

RANDOLPH,  Edmund,  quoted, 
54,  101,  108,  127;  tells  of 
Henry's  rise  to  power,  145- 
148;  195-197;  in  the  May 
Convention  of  1776,  256; 
credits  Henry  with  the  re 
ligious  liberty  section  in 
the  Bill  of  Rights,  266-267; 
3°7»  3I5J  and  the  Federal 


Constitution,  330,  et  seq.; 
as  Governor  of  Virginia, 
336;  M.  D.  Conway,  on,  336, 
in  Philadelphia  Conven 
tion,  339;  in  Richmond 
Convention,  344,  et  seq.;  his 
collision  with  Henry,  351; 

363- 

RANDOLPH,  John,  Peyton's 
brother,  examines  Henry 
on  law,  45-47. 

RANDOLPH,  John  of  Roanoke, 
on  Clark's  Conquest,  297; 
331,  380;  on  Henry  in  the 
British  Debt  case,  390-391; 
climbs  Peaks  of  Otter,  393- 
394;  395,  402  (n);  meets 
Henry  at  Charlotte  Court 
house,  420,  el  seq. 

RANDOLPH,  Peyton,  examines 
Henry  on  law,  45-46;  in 
House  of  Burgesses,  90,  93, 
95,  98,  in,  143,  153,  188, 
200,  256. 

RANDOLPH,  Richard,  of  "Bi 
zarre,"  380-382. 

Red  Hill,  Henry's  last  home, 
393,  et  seq.;  beauty  of,  397; 
house  at,  398. 

REED,  Joseph,  on  Henry,  223; 
290. 

Religious  Liberty,  incorpo 
rated  through  Henry  in  the 
Virginia  Bill  of  Rights,  266- 
267. 

RICE,  Dr.  John  H.,  Henry's 
remark  to,  45,  422,  423. 

RIVES,  William  Cabell,  80-81; 
93,  his  tribute  to  Henry, 


488 


INDEX 


in;  138;  his  tribute  to 
Mason,  269;  355. 

ROANE,  Mrs.  Anne,  Henry's 
daughter,  marriage  of,  238; 
letter  to  on  a  wife's  duties, 
243-244;  426. 

ROANE,  John,  minute  de 
scription  of  Henry's  great 
est  speech,  193-195. 

ROANE,  Judge  Spencer,  119, 
136,  204,  242,  250;  270-271; 
310-311;  323,  351,  368,395, 
426,  429;  memorandum  of, 
435,  el.  seq. 

ROBERTSON,  David,  reports 
debates  in  Virginia  Federal 
Convention,  343;  reports 
British  Debt  case,  388. 

ROBINSON,  Rev.  John,  422. 

ROBINSON,  John,  Speaker  of 
House  of  Burgesses,  81 ; 
loan-office  plan,  82-84;  93- 

ROBINSON,  William,  Commis 
sary,  101-102. 

ROBINSON,  Rev.  William, 
' '  New  Light , ' '  converts  a 
tavern-keeper,  51-52;  56. 

RODNEY,  Caesar,  in  Continen 
tal  Congress,  157. 

ROOSEVELT,  Theodore,  quo 
ted,  327. 

ROTHERMEL,  P.  F.,  painting, 
99  (n). 

"Roundabout,"  Henry's  Lou 
isa  County  home,  112-116. 

ROWLAND,  Miss  Kate  Mason, 
quoted,  265-266. 

RUSH,  Dr.  Benjamin,  151, 
171;  252;  on  Paine's  "Com 


mon     Sense,"     255;     290- 

292. 
RUSSELL,     General     William, 

marries     Elizabeth     Henry 

Campbell,  237. 
RUTLEDGE,    Edward,    in    the 

Continental  Congress,    174- 

J75- 
RUTLEDGE,  John,   106;  in  the 

Continental  Congress,    174- 

175;  277. 
"Salisbury,"     Henry's    house 

while  Governor,  323-324. 
"Scotchtown,"      bought      by 

Henry,   116;  179,   201,   217, 

238, 239,  242 ;  sold  by  Henry, 

250. 

SCOTT,  Judge  John,  "Barba- 
rossa,"  353. 

SEMPLE,  Robert  B.,  on  Hen 
ry's  aid  to  the  Baptists, 

!25- 

SHELBY,  Evan,  his  expedition 
against  the  Cherokees,  278. 

SHELTON,  John,  Henry's  fa 
ther-in-law,  39,  41,  48; 
helped  by  Henry,  114. 

SHERLOCK,  Bishop  Thomas, 
366. 

SHORT,  William,  to  Jefferson, 
332. 

SMITH,  Meriwether,  his  plan  of 
government,  262. 

SMITH,  John,  controversy  over, 
10-12  (n). 

SMITH,  John  Blair,  and  Henry, 
341- 

Sons  of  Liberty,  103,  106,  151- 
152,  181 


489 


INDEX 


Spain,  as  a  weight  in  the  bal 
ance,  177-178;  feeling  the 
pulse  of,  on  independence, 
253;  declares  war,  300-301. 

SPEECE,  Rev.  Conrad,  quoted, 
378-380. 

SPOTSWOOD,  Governor  Alex 
ander,  201,  319. 

Stamp  Act,  84,  et  seq.;  as 
cause  of  the  American  Rev 
olution,  90;  agitation,  103, 
et  seq.;  Stamp  Act  Congress, 
105-107;  repeal  of,  108. 

STANARD,  William  G.,  quo 
ted,  2  TO. 

STEUBEN,  Baron,  as  drill- 
master,  230;  in  Virginia,  3 07. 

St.  John's  Church,  Richmond, 
description  of,  187;  story 
told  on  steps  of,  374. 

STUART,   Archibald,    308-309; 

SU-SJS- 

"  Studley,"  Henry's  birthplace 
18-19. 

SULLIVAN,  William,  "Public 
Characters,"  etc.,  quoted, 
370. 

SULLY,  Thomas,  paints  Hen 
ry's  portrait,  117-119;  124. 

SYME,  John,  the  immigrant,  18. 

SYME,  John,  Henry's  half- 
brother,  205,  251,  276,  417. 

SYME,  Mrs.  Sarah.  See  Sarah 
Winston  Henry. 

TARLETON,  Sir  Banastre,  14; 
in  Virginia,  301,  et  ieq. 

TAYLOR,  John  of  Caroline, 
strange  story  told  by,  308, 
331- 


TAZEWELL,  Henry,  315;  on 
Henry's  way  of  whirling 
his  wig,  353  (n). 

THACHER,  Oxenbridge,  on  Vir 
ginians,  103. 

THOMSON,  Charles,  his  life 
sketched,  160,  et  seq.;  ser 
vices  in  the  Continental 
Congress,  161;  tells  of  Hen 
ry,  162-164;  °n  the  high 
quality  of  the  delegates, 
176. 

Tobacco  as  money,  59. 

TOWNSHEND,  Charles,  130,132. 

"Tuckahoes,"  24,  54,  91;  and 
"Qo'hees,"  93. 

TUCKER,  Beverley,  quoted,  10. 

TUCKER,  Judge  St.  George, 
gives  description  of  Henry, 
121-123;  I45»  J^4'  T86,  187; 
tells  of  Henry  in  St.  John's 
Church,  192-193;  and  other 
Tuckers,  211;  criticises  Hen 
ry,  281,  et  seq.;  380. 

Twopenny  Act,  60-63. 

TYLER,  Lyon  G.,  on  the  Vir 
ginia  Peninsula  as  the 
"cradle  of  the  Union,"  77; 
on  early  democracy,  92  (n). 

TYLER,  Moses  Coit,  on  the 
"Parsons'  Cause,"  61;  on 
Stamp  Act  Resolutions, 
101-102;  184;  admirable 
survey  of  Henry's  position 
in  March,  1775,  191;  202; 
272;  on  Dictatorship,  278; 
on  "honeyed  testimony," 
280-281;  333,  359,  452. 
426  (n). 


490 


INDEX 


TYLER,  Judge  John,  on  flog-  j 
ging  in  school,  24;  on  Hen-  i 
ry's  eloquence,  in  contested 
election  case,  76;  hears  the 
"Treason"  speech,  98;  tells 
of  talk  with  Henry,  no; 
names  son  after  Henry,  135; 
136;  hears  Henry's  speech 
in  St.  John's,  187 ;  humorous 
scene  from  "Life"  of,  305- 
306;  and  Henry,  312-315; 
in  Virginia  Federal  Conven 
tion,  344,  et  seq.;  on  Hen 
ry's  republicanism  at  the 
close  of  his  life,  413. 

VENABLE,  Richard  N.,  refer 
ence  to  Henry  in  Diary  of, 

325,  357- 

Virginia,  early  history,  9-12; 
topography,  12-13;  malaria 
in,  17;  Huguenots,  19; 
stores  in,  36-37;  society  in, 
53;  Established  Church,  54- 
59;  tobacco  currency,  59: 
the  Peninsula,  77,  90;  loyal 
ists  in,  210;  proposes  that 
the  colonies  declare  inde 
pendence,  258;  organizes  as 
a  Commonwealth,  260,  et 
seq.;  gives  up  Northwest 
Territory,  297;  assents  to 
the  Ordinance  of  1787,  297- 
298;  British  invasion  of, 
301,  et  seq.;  Constitutional 
convention  in,  327,  et  seq. 

WALPOLE,  Sir  Robert,  88, 
130. 

WARREN,  Joseph,  171;  Henry 
on  death  of,  214. 


WASHINGTON,  George,  his 
"cure  for  chills,"  54;  109, 
117,  134,  143,  149-150;  153; 
entertains  Henry  at  Mount 
Vernon,  154;  journeys  with 
him  to  Philadelphia,  155- 
156;  184,  1 86,  1 88;  advice 
sought,  201;  made  Com- 
mander-in-Chief ,  214,  218; 
prefers  Henry  in  the  forum 
to  Henry  in  the  field,  223; 
as  slaveholder,  245;  un 
furls  the  Union  flag,  254; 
277,  279,  286;  and  Charles 
Lee,  289,  et  seq.;  and  the 
Conway  Cabal,  290,  et  seq.; 
301 ;  as  Dictator  in  Virginia, 
309;  and  "Pete,"  309;  Hou- 
don's  statue  of,  316;  320; 
and  the  Federal  Convention, 
329,  337.  338,  339;  as  Presi 
dent,  407;  and  Jefferson, 
409-410;  411;  his  final  rela 
tions  with  Henry,  416,  et 
seq.;  his  appeal  to  Henry, 
418-419;  444. 

WASHINGTON,  Martha,  to  del 
egates  going  to  the  Contin 
ental  Congress,  155;  kins 
woman  of  Dorothea  Dan- 
dridge  Henry  318. 

WATKINS,  Colonel  Joel, 
402  (n);  419. 

WEBSTER,  Daniel,  talks  with 
Jefferson,  45,  136. 

WELLS,  William  V.,  quoted, 
90. 

WHITEFIELD,  George,  anec 
dote  of,  22-23. 


491 


INDEX 


William  and  Mary  College, 
anecdote  of  founder,  55; 

77- 

Williamsburg,  described,  78; 
"Old  Capitol"  at,  91-92; 
"Palace"  at,  134;  Raleigh 
Tavern,  135;  incident  in, 
136;  First  Virginia  Conven 
tion  held  in,  143;  Powder 
Horn  in,  199,  et  seq. 

Williamsburg  Gazette,  quoted, 
13-14,  201,  220,  225;  prints 
a  Government  scheme,  262; 
panic  news  in,  279. 

WILSON,  Rachel,  Quakeress, 
meets  Henry,  125. 

WILSON,  Woodrow,  quoted, 
109. 

WINSTON,  Judge  Edmund,  73, 
76;  on  Henry's  return  to  the 
bar,  324;  365,  451,  453;  457. 

WINSTON,  William  ("Lang- 
loo"),  eloquence  of,  20. 

WINTHROP,  John,  quoted,  252. 

WIRT,  William,  on  Henry's 
boyhood,  23-34;  character 


of,  28-29;  and  Jefferson, 
49;  65;  tells  how  Henry  en 
tered  the  House  of  Bur 
gesses,  79;  96;  Sully  picture 
painted  for,  118;  is  misled 
by  Jefferson,  171-172;  on 
Henry's  resistance  speech, 
180;  185-187; 201-202; 276; 
3J4,  3l6>  35J-352  (n) ;  354, 
367;  on  British  Debt  case, 
386,  388-389;  419. 

WOODFORD,  General  William, 
opposes  Henry  as  a  soldier, 
218,  et  seq. 

WORMLEY,  Ralph,  last  of  the 
Loyalists,  211-212;  and 
Landon  Carter,  280-281  (n). 

"Writs  of  Assistance,"   89. 

WYTHE,  George,  law  exam 
iner,  45-47;  described,  82; 
90-91,  95,  in,  188,  262, 
275;  anecdote  of,  288;  296; 
quotes  Henry  to  law  stu 
dents,  314;  in  Virginia  Fed 
eral  Convention,  343,  et  seq. 

Yazoo    Frauds,    400-402   (n). 


492 


14  DAY  USE 

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